


When the Dust Settles

by Froggyflan



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, BUT THE SMUT IS FINALLY HERE, Hand Jobs, Heavy Angst, Heavy Fluff, M/M, Pre-Relationship, This barely has coffee in it honestly, slowburn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2016-12-03
Packaged: 2018-07-28 17:09:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 28,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7649362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Froggyflan/pseuds/Froggyflan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jamie is a barista, Mako is a construction worker, and this coffee shop is the best place in town.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Flat White

**Author's Note:**

> Oh my gosh this is a trade fic for Fingurken.tumblr.com! She drew me some choice smut and she's wonderful.
> 
> This is multi-chapter and I'm scared because I can never finish things, so I hope this goes well....

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Illustrated by the kind and talented lokki-lokki.tumblr.com

Today is different.

There’s something off, something new. The days have started to run together, and he can’t tell the difference between yesterday and last Friday. Summer always feels like that. Today doesn’t.

The coffee shop is quiet. Dim lights and calm music, maybe too aesthetically pleasing. He was never a fan of the decor or the patrons or really anything about this place. But he likes his coworkers and they really do have the best coffee in town. Probably because he works there. No bias.

Jamie taps his fingers on the counter as he watches his friends try to keep busy, cleaning and organizing where they can. They don’t seem bothered by the feeling he’s getting.

“Is something different?” He asks eventually. Lucio is the first one to perk up, smiling wide and warm as always.

“They’re building something over there, man.”

He looks out the window, and it’s across the street. Signs and loose dirt and chain link fences. Machines and people. The sounds are starting to come through his ruined ears, muffled buzzing and clanging. He’s mesmerized by it.

“You don’t really pay attention to your surroundings, do you?”

“Nah,” he agrees.

It’s early afternoon, and the few customers they have are hiding in corners behind laptops and textbooks. There isn’t much to do, and he tries to actually work, but he can’t stop staring at the mess outside. Powerful metal contraptions ripping apart the earth. Booming, destructive, lovely.

“What are you looking at?” Hana chirps, and leans against him to see. “Are they blowing stuff up?”

“Not yet,” and he can’t help the disappointment that settles in his tone. He doesn’t want to miss a moment of it.

It’s all very beautiful, he thinks, the way the jackhammer breaks concrete, the shrill piercing sound of it. It makes him fidget. He’s an amateur builder, a tinkerer. He likes to make things, keep his hands busy. He likes to see things blow up in a quick moment of fire and wreckage, builds things to break them. An anarchist. Watching them work makes him itch, and he can’t tear away from it.

The customers file in as it gets later, the buzz of caffeine needed after a long day’s work, and he jumps at the chance to serve them. Jamie is good at what he does, goes the extra mile to add to the recipe or put more flare into it. The customers like the creativity, and his boss likes that they like it. He serves the drinks quickly, with a finesse he can only reserve for work. Otherwise, he’s a twitchy clumsy idiot.

He notices with the evening drawing nearer that the low rumble of construction has died, and it’s too calm, too dull. Has it always felt this way?

He’s wiping down the counter when the door opens with a jingle and there’s a rush of bodies. He’s not used to so many people here this late. They’ve all got safety jackets on, sweaty and dirty and rough around the edges. Construction workers.

They’re loud and smiley as they place their orders, definitely having caught Lucio’s contagiously good attitude. Hana grumbles about having to stay later to clean up their mess, but Jamie is entranced with the smell of dirt and rubble that they’ve brought with them. It clings to the air, and it’s practically clouding around them. He thinks of steel and dynamite.

“Earth to Jamie, you gonna start on these orders or am I alone here?” Hana snaps at him, and he takes a sharp breath through his nose, saluting her with a grin.

“Yes, ma’am! I’m on it!”

He’s gentle when he handles the machines, artistic when the foam kisses the coffee in just the right way, fluffy, textured. He takes an extra moment to draw in the lattes, pouring patterns delicately. The men are impressed and he is satisfied.

His last order for the night is a flat white; his specialty. He steams the milk to perfection, enjoying the heat of the metal cup in his hands. The steamer is loud and has a high pitched whistle. He whistles back. He loves the science of it, turning liquid into a foam, but just barely. It was a matter of timing. Not too much air, smooth, velvety. He watches the gauge carefully and swirls the wand about.

Every night, his last drink is always the best. He has all the patience in the world for this, doesn’t need to be anywhere else but here, making art. Going out with a bang.

He pours the foam into the espresso quickly, feeling it hit the bottom of the cup before spilling to the top. He makes swift motions, little white leaves starting to appear in the creamy brown beverage. A wreath.

He sets it on the counter lovingly, and Hana praises him with a smile, already forgetting about her extra work. He picks up the receipt to call out a name, but there isn’t one.

“Lucio, whose is this?” 

Lucio glances up from counting the money in the register. “He wouldn’t give me his name.” Wouldn’t be the first time. Strange how paranoid people could be about their names, but give their credit card to anyone who asked.

“Flat white!” Jamie calls out, and the mass of customers don’t even look up. He sighs and takes the time to admire the design. He hopes the guy didn’t leave. A work of art like this needs to be appreciated. If he did leave, at least Jamie would drink it. It’d leave him jittery all night, but he couldn’t let it go to waste.

He hears a grunt, deep and raspy, and his eyes shoot up to take in the man suddenly looming over him.

The first thing that comes to mind is big, huge, is this man a giant? He’s the only one from the crew not wearing a safety jacket, and he immediately knows why. They couldn’t possibly make them in his size. Arms as big as tree trunks bulge out under a dirty white shirt, muscles on top of muscles.

His face is intimidating, wide nose and thick lips, square jaw, small eyes. He’s got the face of a serial killer or a bouncer or maybe a pro wrestler. He looks like he could punch a shark without hesitation. 

Something about this guy makes Jamie’s brain go a little stupid. A lot stupid.

He feels his mouth moving, but it doesn’t compute and he says the only thing that makes sense. “Big.”

The man gives him an odd look, and Jamie snaps his open mouth shut, feels the heat in his face. He’s about to walk off with his shoulders shrugged up to his ears in embarrassment, but he’s met with a gruff snort not unlike a pig, dusty brown lips tugged up at the corners in what he thinks is probably a smile. He can’t stop staring at it.

“Yeah,” the man says, and it’s strong and thunderous, like the sound of a well oiled engine. Jamie feels his heart beat a little faster. The man takes his coffee and is gone in an instant.

For a moment his head is still swimming, the dim lights suddenly too bright, and there’s a sickening silence, the hum of chatting customers fading out. His eyes can’t focus, and there’s something in his mouth, like cotton. It hasn’t settled in.

“What the hell?” Hana bursts out laughing, holding her sides. “What the fuck?”

Lucio tries to keep his laugh in politely, but it doesn’t work. “Jamie, are you okay, man?”

They’d watched him make a fool of himself. Jamie slaps his hands onto his face and lets out a groan that slowly morphs into a quiet scream.

Jesus Christ.


	2. Intervening

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's the short but sweet second part!

He’s curious.

Every day he rushes into work hours early, bouncing with energy, and nothing can keep him away from that damn window. He pushes through his tasks like a man on fire just so he can sit and watch.

They let him do it, not like they have anything better for him to do. He does everything they need him to, takes out the trash and buses tables the second they're available. The place is spotless at every point of the day.

His new favorite chore is to clean the glass. He gets to step outside to wipe down the doors, and he’s surrounded by the sounds and smells of chaos. The yellow metal monsters shirk and quake through their motions, revving loud. Dust billows over the entire block, gray as smog, and they’re disturbing the earth violently. Jamie takes a deep breath, exhales with a contented hum, and leans against the wall.

The workers are yelling and laughing and enjoying their job. It’s hard to hear over the grumble of machines, and he was half deaf as it was, but it was strange how it could be so soothing and exciting at the same time.

There he is, he thinks, and he feels his back go rigid. Big broad shoulders. He’s lifting bags of cement or something, and the way he hefts it onto his hulking arms definitely makes Jamie feel something. He’s far away and he can’t see his face, but he remembers it vividly in his moment of shame, the way those eyes looked at him.

He bites his lip, reliving that gut wrenching embarrassment. Way to go, Jamie. No amount of studying or building could calm his shaky hands that night. He’d spilled nuts and bolts all over his work station, and then he knocked a can of gasoline over and nearly caught the place on fire again. All he could think of was that voice. He wants to hear it again.

A jackhammer starts up, and even through his popped ears he feels the painful tittering. He reluctantly goes back inside, attention still glued to the carnage across the street.

Things slow down around the same time every day. It’s a routine that he has always hated. He needs to stay busy or he gets fidgety, needs to focus on something. The scene outside keeps him grounded, lets him think and wonder and memorize. He’s still, quiet, and everything is fine.

“Do you see him?”

He doesn’t even know who asks him, doesn’t tear his eyes away. White shirt, tan skin, muscles.

“Yeah.”

The work stops in the early afternoon, and he watches the men stretch and slap each other on the back and group together. They pull out thermoses and brown paper bags, friendly banter running across animated mouths, silent. Jamie sees him.

He’s hunched over, wiping sweat from his face with the back of his hand. A coworker nudges the man, and he is so small in comparison to the behemoth, but he doesn’t look afraid. He watches the man talk and pitch a thumb over his shoulder, and after a moment the big guy shrugs curtly. They turn to the shop and begin walking toward it, and Jamie feels the breath in his lungs leave and fail to return.

There’s a hand on his shoulder, and a soft voice in his ear. “Hey, you got this.”

The both of them push him toward the register, and it must be difficult for them the way his heels dig in and he leans back. They’re barely past 5 feet tall, and he towers over them like they’re children. Hana shoves at his hip hard.

“Get it together, beanpole!”

He stumbles as they give him the final push, and the door is open and he’s there, looking at the menu, and Jamie can’t stop gawking. The man already knows what he wants, and Jamie assumes he’s not a fan of change, because he’s looking at him now too, dark eyes and furrowed brows and there’s that weird half smile that makes his knees weak and he isn’t even sure if that’s a smile or a sneer.

Hana kicks him in the ankle and he remembers there’s another customer, this one more friendly looking, round face and crinkly eyes. Jamie takes his order in a daze. He feels Lucio and Hana’s intense stares on him.

The big man stands right in front of the register, and his tongue feels fuzzy like it did the last time. He isn’t sure what to do, if the man is waiting for him to do something or if he’s just admiring the stupid look that must be on Jamie’s face.

“Flat white,” he says, and there’s that sound he’s been dreaming of, the rumble of thunder, deep as the ocean. His fingers go on autopilot, ringing him up without even looking. He tries not to stare, but his eyes refuse. His heart is starting to pound in his chest and he feels a nervous smile bloom across his face, a defensive giggle bubbling up his throat. He grabs a paper cup and holds a marker to it a little too shakily.

“Name?”

The man doesn’t answer, but he gives him that same odd look as before, like he’s saying something dumb again. Jamie knows his cheeks are pink, the little shiver in his spine must be so obvious to everyone around him.

“I’m going to make something up,” he tells him bravely, and the man stays silent, as if he’s daring him to. And he will take that dare and run with it. Jamie draws a little bomb on the side of the cup, round and smiling. He sets it on the counter, and the man moves away, pulling out his phone to check the time.

Jamie turns his back on him to start the order, and he’s screaming internally, as loud as the whistling steamer he’s attending. He burns himself on the edge of the wand and curses under his breath, but he’s riding higher than he has in ages. Talking to him feels like he’s building a bomb, exhilarating and dangerous, even if he’s the only one saying anything.

Lucio leans in close, and Jamie burns his hand again. “You’re a mess, man. Chill out.”

“Can’t,” and he’s grinning, stupid and anxious. “He’s me type.”

“Big? Dirty? Scary?”

“All of the above.”

Hana is at his side too, holding the paper cup full of espresso, and she has a catlike smirk on her lips. “Hurry it up with that foam.”

“Ya guys are making me claustrophobic, get outta here!”

Hana hands him the cup, and he’s annoyed by that knowing little smile she has, but he’s still grinning and he doesn’t know if he can stop.

He won’t bother with the latte art this time. The guy’s just going to put a lid on it, won’t even see it. He at least makes it presentable, a perfect circle of white in a sea of milky brown.

Before he can open his mouth to call out the order, to think of a fun name to call him by, he’s already there waiting. He shoves his phone back into his pocket and eyes Jamie over again.

He thinks he may trip on his way over, but he doesn’t, and he gently pushes the cup toward him. For a moment he thinks this will be like those lovey-dovey shows that Hana always watches, where they brush their hands together and instantly fall in love. But it isn’t. The man waits for him to let go before picking it up. Jamie notices the letters L-E-F-T tattooed on his knuckles, and they’re so thick. His hands must be the size of Jamie’s torso for fuck’s sake.

The man looks down at his drink, and he frowns as if he were disappointed, like he was expecting the pretty patterns and designs. It makes his throat tighten. He’s floundering at the the thought of the man noticing anything about him at all.

He takes a lid from the stack on the counter, and Jamie can’t get over the fact that he let him down. He grunts, nods his thanks, and walks out the door with his friend. And that’s it.

Jamie takes a slow calming breath and runs a hand through his tangled blond hair. That was much easier than last time. He needs to step up his game if he’s going to get anywhere. He needs to practice his latte art, learn not to choke on his own tongue, maybe say something funny. The guy doesn’t look like he laughs much. Maybe if he did something dumb he’d laugh. Worth a shot.

“I wrote your phone number on the cup.”

He turns around so fast he feels the earth spin, and he bangs his knee on the corner of the counter loudly. As he doubles over, clutching it tightly, he’s practically crying. Hana’s smirking down at him with narrow eyes.

“Are ya kidding me?” It comes out small and incredulous.

“Nope.”

His hands return to his hair, and he crushes it down to his head with a shrill whine. This is a nightmare. His face is red and he’s definitely going to start crying any second.

He decides he’s going to hide in the cabinets for the rest of his shift.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shhh more to come..............
> 
> Froggyflan.tumblr.com


	3. It Goes Off

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You thought this was going to be a fluffy fun fic, didn't you?
> 
> You were wrong.

He is determined.

Nothing came of the phone number stunt, except for Hana apologizing profusely when he started to hyperventilate. After a while, he got over it. After more of a while, he counted it as a blessing, a step forward. He started holding on to his phone a little bit more tightly, checking it more often. Every buzz or beep would set him on edge, fishing it out of his pocket like it was on fire. But it was never him.

And maybe that made him a little pissed, a little frustrated. Maybe he wasn’t interested. And why would he be? He’s a big tough macho guy, and Jamie’s just some skinny annoying kid who stares at him too much. A weirdo.

He waits for the afternoon break impatiently. The man doesn’t come in every day, only when his coworkers goad him into it. He brings a thermos just like the rest of them. On those days, he watches him eat his lunch from afar. He never knows what he’s eating because his Hulk hands envelop it completely. It’s funny, but also absolutely distracting how fucking big they are. He daydreams about what they’d do with him. He has to stop himself from thinking too much and getting a boner on the clock.

When the time comes, the whistle blows, and he takes a deep breath, hoping, wishing, reeling in excitement. The man stretches his back, big belly peeking out under his dirty shirt, and Jamie bites his lip at the sight of it all. He imagines the loud cracking of cartilage, the ripple of sore muscles, the groan of relief. Sweat beads and rolls over tan spotted skin, and there’s that boner feeling again. Calm down.

He watches the men approach him, and the breath sticks in his throat. Today’s a good day, definitely. The man turns to them, and he glances at the shop like he’s looking for Jamie to pop out of the door and wave at him. He’s tempted to do so. The man shrugs and follows.

Shake it out. He could do this.

Lucio is at the register, but he quickly shoves him out of the way with a bump to the hips. He scoffs, but still smiles at Jamie. “Alright, psyche yourself up, buddy. You got this.”

“I got this.”

The door opens and there's the gaggle, yammering and pointing at the menu. The man is in the back, looking at his phone, looking out the window. He doesn't want to be here. 

Jamie is a little crestfallen at the idea, but he stays strong. He can do this.

They line up one by one, and he takes their orders robotically. He doesn't hear their voices, they’re muffled fuzzy sounds as he focuses on the man’s fingers pressing into his too-small phone, white hair gathered into a thick puff at the back of his head, the long dark scar on his right cheek. He pieces together odd syllables he catches to write names on the cups, and he doesn't care if they're wrong.

The man is always the last in line, and that makes him wonder. Is he being courteous or does he want to spend the extra time with Jamie? He's hot under the collar by the time he’s in front of him. 

“Let me guess,” Jamie says, and the tremble in his voice is barely there. He can do it. “Flat white.”

The man grunts in acknowledgement, handing him the exact cash. Jamie longs for him to use a credit card so he can know his name. He takes the money with an outstretched hand, and the man's rough thumb touches his palm just barely, sending fire to his brain and out to the tips of his hair. He holds in the sigh threatening to escape him. 

Jamie draws a little rat on the side of the cup and freezes abruptly. Maybe he wasn't calling him because he didn't see the phone number last time. He smiles in that nervous way he always does and writes it out in big bold numbers before he thinks it through. Oh god he was doing it.

Jamie begins the foaming process, and he mulls over what he's going to say next. Something funny? Maybe he should take the suave approach. He remembers there’s not a suave bone in his stupid body. Funny it is, then.

“Mate, ya like jokes? Ya seem like a fun guy.”

He doesn’t say anything, but he has his attention. He’s looking at him with those intense eyes that make him feel like he’s pinned and can’t escape. He gulps and grins over his shoulder.

“Why don’t ya ever see pigs hidin’ in trees?”

The man doesn’t answer.

“Because they’re really good at it.”

The man still doesn’t answer. Jamie feels his smile grow more and more tight and anxious.

“Ya supposed to laugh, mate.”

The man doesn’t answer again, and Jamie turns back to his foam. His heart pulses in his throat and his teeth grind silently. Alright then.

His guts are in knots as he begins pouring the foam into the coffee. He’s got shaky hands now, and his eyes are starting to sting (it’s the steam), but he manages to draw a little cartoon pig, pointed ears and a big X on the snout. When he slides it over the counter, Jamie can’t bear to look at him, can’t handle the feelings in his head right now.

The man grunts his usual thanks, and against his better judgement he does look at him, and there’s that smile/sneer that gets his head in the clouds. The man is looking at the little pig with an appreciation he wants to be directed at Jamie and Jamie alone.

He’s gone in an instant, just like always, and Jamie feels like he’s going to puke.

“I can’t do this,” he whispers to no one, but they hear him anyway. “’m such an idiot.”

“Hey, come on,” Lucio saddles up to him quickly, and Hana rushes over just the same. “You did really good this time!”

“He liked the piggy!” Hana chirps, reaching up to smack him in the shoulder. “But shit, you’re bad at jokes.”

Jamie bites his knuckle and groans into it. His brain wasn’t sure if he should be crying from embarrassment or euphoria.

He decides both, and he aches all over. This was killing him.

He thinks he’s getting better.

Every day is new and exciting. Each afternoon break is a surprise that he becomes accustomed to, learns to prepare for. Each new encounter makes him braver, less nervous, more forward.

He learns to say things slower, less giggling. The man doesn’t seem to like the way he laughs. And that’s to be expected. It’s a terrible sound. He catches on to what the man will acknowledge, what he’ll grunt at, what he won’t. One day he explains the process of making a flat white, and he seems interested. He even nods. It sends jolts of electricity behind his eyes.

Jamie asks him questions knowing he won’t get an answer, and that’s okay. He talks at him, and the man looks at him, really looks at him like he’s listening and everything, and he could talk all day so long as he doesn’t look away. When Jamie looks him in the eye, his fingers itch like he needs to build things.

And build he does. He becomes focused on his hobby. He goes late into the night tinkering and designing until his fingers are sore and blistered from holding pencils too tight, turning screwdrivers for hours. He reads more, learns more, practices.

It’s a dangerous thing he’s got going. Homemade explosives and lack of sleep don’t mix. Clumsy shaky fingers don’t help either, but the tinkering slows him down, lets him breathe. After a day of anxiety, he holes himself into his studio so it’s just him and the lovely smell of gunpowder and metal, plastics burning and wet paint. There’s a lively jitter in everything he does now, keeps him awake all the time. He’s getting bags under his eyes, dark and red, but he creates until he falls asleep with his tools spread out around him. He’s usually late for work on those days.

He feels the eyes on the back of his neck, on days like that, and the man must notice the sluggish way he works the machines, the tiredness on his face. He wants more than anything to think that look is one of worry. Maybe he’d ask him if he were okay, and he’d tell him yeah, now that you’re here. Dreaming hurts.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” Jamie tells him, and if that’s the wrong thing to say, he wouldn’t know, because the man grunts regardless. The high he used to feel from hearing that sound starts to dull into an ugly twisting hold on his heart.

He couldn’t remember how he came about being an amateur anarchist. He was always getting into fights in high school, and throwing a punch with his scrawny little arms didn’t do much against big blokes. What he needed to win was fear. It started with cherry bombs in the toilet, or firecrackers in pockets. Watching someone screaming in terror was all he could ever manage.

As an adult, the feeling never went away, but the people did. He couldn’t rightfully scare himself like that, but reading into it, he could very well frighten himself while building a goddamn bomb.

Maybe it wasn’t so much fear as it was exhilaration, thrill, knowing at any moment he’d go out in a big beautiful boom that would smolder the earth and cause all the wreckage he could ever ask for. He’d build it all to break it.

He writes his phone number on every cup now. He writes it bigger every time, maybe if it’s big enough he’ll finally notice it. Day after day, he doesn’t, and Jamie stares at the blank screen of his phone until he can’t handle it anymore. He falls asleep thinking of all the things he would text him. Ask him about his day. Ask him if he wants to go see a movie. Just say “hey”. Nothing seems right, it’s all just dreams. This crush had been so intoxicating, and now it was crippling.

The way the metal casing fit snugly together after a few screws and a bit of sanding made him proud. He’d painted a silly little peace sign on the front of it, sloppy and bold against the yellow plastic centerpiece. Now that it was done, he’d just add it to the pile. It’s not like he was planning to go out and murder anyone with it. He’d build it, and hide it away for when he needed it, nights when he was lonely, nights where he’d remember all the stupid things he’d said to the man, welled up into an extraordinarily unsettling pain in his core. He’d touch the smooth cold edges of his bomb and think of how hot and perfect it would be going off. How would it feel?

“Ya real handsome,” Jamie had told him. It was a Friday, a cloudy day, an odd feeling in his stomach. The monsoon was rolling in, and it was a better day than ever for a hot cup of coffee. Not a good day for anything else. “Just so ya know.”

The man doesn’t grunt, and Jamie knows he’s giving him that look, the one when he’s said something stupid. He always says something stupid. “I like your voice.”

When he turns back to hand him the coffee, that familiar peace sign drawn in brown and white, the man is frowning, bold and loose on thick brown lips, but it makes Jamie smile despite the tightness in his face begging him not to.

“Yeah, I know. Forget I said anything.”

 

It’s one of those nights. The clock says it’s past 3 in the morning, but he had stopped paying attention after midnight. He rubs a hand over his eyes and they burn, like he hasn’t blinked in hours. His book is covered in sticky notes and earmarks, scribbles that he had thought were legible at the time look like the musings of a kindergartner. He can’t remember if he added the oxidizer.

The smell of ammonia doesn’t affect him anymore. Maybe he’d burned his sense of smell away. He’s feeling light headed and breathing is difficult. Maybe he was drowning in toxic fumes and he didn’t even know. He’s spiraling, he knows it. When the days start to fade into each other again, like they did before he met him, it makes him like this. It’s not worth it, what he’s doing to himself. But he can’t stop.

He tightens the cap on his newest masterpiece, adding a bit of hot glue at the edges for good measure. He paints a funny face on the side of the pipe. As he turns it in his hand, he feels it.

Warm, red, white. Hot, like he knew it would be. There is no warning. The little yellow face in his palm grins wide.

It goes off, and he’s gone with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Froggyflan.tumblr.com


	4. Deep Breath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY SHIT THIS CHAPTER IS ILLUSTRATED BY THE BEAUTIFUL AND AMAZING LOKKI-LOKKI.TUMBLR.COM I AM IN TEARS. She drew the picture before I even finished the chapter, and looking at it actually helped me a lot with writing it. I am still so overwhelmed by it. I can't handle my feelings right now.
> 
> Anyway, I am so so sorry this was really fun to write and I apologize.

He’s slow to open his eyes, and the world is starting to come back together from the dark. It’s blurry, like trying to look through a rippling pond.

Jamie feels like he’s weighed down with cinder blocks, uncomfortably warm and suffocated. He can barely feel his own body, and he takes an experimental breath. His lungs send a raspy vibration through him, and it’s so so difficult.

The place he finds himself in is murky, white. He registers movement, gold. It moves close to him, around him, and he can’t follow it very well. He blinks, but his eyes feel like they’re glued together with tar. The dizzy visions are focusing piece by piece, and the white turns into a hospital room, the gold turns into a person, a woman. Her blond hair is tied up high on her head, and she is as beautiful as she is flustered. She moves around him quickly, marking off charts and checking the machines next to him. He tilts his head to follow her, but it makes him groan in pain. She jumps back and looks at him with wide blue eyes, a pitiful smile. She comes to his side quickly, sitting on the edge of the bed and pressing a cool gentle hand on his.

Her lips are tight, like she’s trying to decide if she wants to speak.

She pats his hand, and she looks so hesitant, so interested in him. He starts to open his mouth, and she shifts closer to open hers too, as if to mimic him.

The words come out, he feels them, the hum that bounces back to his brain, the roll of his jaw.

But that’s all.

She’s watching him intently as he tries again, says the words again, maybe a third time. Where am I, he asks, he knows he’s asking it. His lips are moving, he’s saying it, he has to be saying it. She’s nodding like she can hear it, but he’s not. He can’t hear it.

His breathing gets a little lighter as he tries harder, maybe he’s just saying it too quietly. Who knows how long he’s been out, when the last time he spoke was. He raises his volume, the rumble in his chest big, and she flinches a little. She can hear him. He’s loud, and he can’t hear it.

He can’t hear it.

Her hand is on his chest now as it starts to heave heavy breaths in and out. She scoots closer, and he isn’t sure if her presence is calming him down or making him feel trapped. She is showing him the clipboard in her arms

Damaged stereocilia (EXTENSIVE)  
Perforated tympanic membrane (LEFT / RIGHT)  
Cochlear trauma (EXTENSIVE)

The words are foreign to him, and with the look he’s giving her, she must understand that. She points to her ear, and he feels his heart bottom out into his guts.

He’s breathing heavier now, and she is so close he can smell her perfume, smells clean linens and anesthetic. She presses against his chest again, soothing, shushing him without saying it. He wouldn’t hear her anyway.

Jamie wouldn’t hear anything, ever.

She is pursing her lips, bringing one hand up and then down in the air, to show him how to breathe. There are stinging tears begging to come out, and they do, ripping down his face so fast he barely feels them. She shakes her head and presses a hand to his chest again, the other hand going up and down, up and down. Breathe, she is saying. Breathe.

A choked sob forces itself up his throat, and of course he can’t hear it. She pets his head with soft manicured fingers. No, breathe, quick, not enough. He’s choking on nothing, and she is trying her damndest to keep him calm. It can’t be helped.

He tries to sit up higher on the bed, but it hurts, pain bursting like a firecracker up his right arm. Jamie goes to look at it, but she’s grabbing his face and yanking it back to look at her, only her.

“It’s okay,” is read across her lips, and her eyes are so blue and hypnotising. She is bearing into him, keeping him still, breathe, that’s right. A hand goes up and down. His eyes shift away from her, pulsing as they try hard to look. What else is wrong with him? She tries to keep his attention on her, but it’s too late. He’s got a feeling he already knows.

He tears his face out of her grip and looks down.

That’s where his hand used to be. Right there. His arm is wrapped tightly in thick white bandages, a stump, just past his elbow. It’s numbed at the end, very numb, but it pulses at him for having moved at all.

Jamie’s lost staring at it, lets her hand take hold of his chin again and draw him away. She is slow, mouthing words at him. “It’s okay,” she says again. “You are okay.”

He’s crying hard, and she is too accepting of it, probably sees it every day, but something about her feels like she does care, that it’s not just her job. He hiccups and gasps and sobs loud, he knows it must be loud. He’s putting his heart into it. The tears keep coming and coming and the trembling is at his very core. She holds his hand and lets him. 

No shame. Only pity.

Jamie tires himself out like that, exhausted by everything. He lays back into his pillow with sore red eyes and a tightness in his chest that refuses to leave. She pats him rhythmically, 1, 2, 3, 4.

“Okay,” she says again, and she is sliding to her feet. She moves to his nightstand, picking up a tall glass of water and a little paper cup full of pills. He has no trouble lifting up his uninjured arm, the only one he’s got now, to take it. He tosses the paper cup back and the pills tumble into his mouth. The water is pure heaven on his dry sticky tongue.

She gestures toward the other items on the nightstand. There’s his phone, blinking madly, and his wallet. She points to a table by the door, and he sees his clothes are folded neatly next to his shoes. The room is sterile, dim, impersonal. There’s a whiteboard by the door with his name on it, followed by strange words and numbers that don’t mean anything, dates, times. Under his name is another name: Angela.

He says the name aloud, and she turns to him with a smile as bright as the sun. She nods curtly and goes about handing him his phone, a remote for the television perched up near the ceiling, and his own clipboard. It’s got a hefty stack of paper and a pen with the hospital’s name on it, Mercy General. At least he knows where he is.

She is at his side again, tapping on the paper with her own pen. She writes the word “Practice” in graceful flowing cursive, and he feels another pang of anguish knowing he is now suddenly left handed. She squeezes his palm reassuringly, and tells him “rest”.

She walks to the whiteboard, pops open a marker, and writes the number three. She points at the clock, which reads 1:54, and back at the whiteboard. She smiles at him again, a finger at her lips like she were shushing him, and said it again. “Rest”.

There’s hesitation as she touches the doorknob, unable to look away, worried. Jamie wonders if she thinks he’ll off himself if she leaves. He nods slowly, pulling his phone up against his chest, and she relaxes. The door opens, she slips out, and he is alone.

Jamie takes a deep, deep breath and lets it stew in him for a long moment before letting it all out at once. The tears are still coming, and he doubts he’ll ever stop shaking. He won’t bother.

The world is quiet.

Another deep breath, but it’s too sharp, too fast. It’s painful in his sob stricken throat. Calm down. The air hitches in his lungs, refuses to come out, and he feels tight and jittery. The dull throbbing in his arm is enough to choke a whimper out. He thinks to look down at it, but slams his eyes shut as soon as it comes to him. No. No, don’t look.

He doesn’t want to think right now, and he hopes whatever pills Angela gave him will make him sleep. He wants to sleep. Anything but going through this nightmare alone.

Clutching the phone to his chest desperately, he presses the button on the side to unlock it. 20 new text messages, 8 voicemails, 10 missed calls. Deep breath.

The voicemails won’t do him any good. He deletes them immediately without another thought.

There’s a slew of messages from Lucio, gradually moving from joking to concerned to panicked, asking where he is, if he’s okay, call him back! It wasn’t like him to miss a shift, not since the summer started. Not since-

No, no. No. Deep breath.

Messages from Hana are relatively the same, but much less sincere, more emojis. She complains that Jamie is being selfish for taking a day off and making Lucio crazy. The responses devolve into pictures of Lucio crying and tugging at his hair.

There’s a curt message from his boss, a sweet old woman like the grandmother he’d always wished for. She asks where he is, and on reflex he is pressing the call button and pressing the phone to his bandaged ear.

It’s a few seconds before his brain catches up with him, before the feeling makes his throat constrict to the point of choking.

He rips it away from his face and presses the end button with a shaky thumb. Deep breath.

It’s difficult to text back with only one hand. His thumb can’t reach the keys to the far right. Instead, he presses the text-to-speech button and holds the phone to his mouth.

“I’m okay,” he says, and the phone hears him, even if he doesn’t. “In the hospital.”

As soon as he sends it he’s getting a call back, like she’s been waiting for him. A picture of her lights up the screen, crinkly smile and brown skin. The phone vibrates in his hand, and he lets out a forced sob. The tears are cold now.

Deep breath.

He rejects it, and goes to send another message. “Please don’t call,” Jamie says, and the phone barely registers the words over his gasping hiccups, “I can’t answer.”

She’s quick to respond, always so quick, even in her age. “Mercy? What room???”

He contemplates the idea of anyone seeing him like this, if he should even tell her. He doesn’t know if he could handle the amount of attention, the pity. He can’t even handle looking at himself. His body trembles and aches, pressing the button.

“Please don’t come.”

He drops the phone into his lap and tries those deep breaths again, but they won’t come out. All that’s left in him is the whining wheeze of a pathetic cry. It makes his shoulders jump and his throat burn.

The phone is still blinking, too soon to have already received a scathing response from his boss. He unlocks it again with a disgusting sniffle, and there’s a message he missed.

An unknown number. Jamie swipes his wrist across his eyes before looking at it again. He presses the button to read it.

“You weren’t in today.”

There’s a moment, small and gentle, where he knows he doesn’t give his phone number to just anyone. But he remembers warm afternoons, writing it on thick paper cups, each more desperate than the last, and each time he pushed those black numbers into those big strong hands, he’d wish they’d stick to his skin so he’d never ever forget them. Don’t forget me.

There’s puddles on his screen as he looks down at it, and he can’t hold it in any longer. The howl leaves him, one he’s never heard before and never will. It hurts more fiercely than his bum arm, that burn in his heart that spreads to his eyes and he feels the tears won’t ever stop coming. He will drown before he gets better.

The world is quiet.


	5. Practice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow sorry, this took forever and it's not even that GOOD but hey, gotta get to the good stuff somehow.

The next time he wakes up, the room is darker, and the ache is dull.

It’s still hard to open his eyes, and when he goes to rub them, nothing happens. He lifts his arm, but there’s nothing there.

He presses his head back into the pillow. Right.

Jamie turns his head to look at the door. The whiteboard doesn’t say 3 anymore. A 6 has been written in its place. He looks at the clock. 4:29. He’d slept through Angela coming back, and it looks like she’d left him a new cup of water, more pills, and a little plastic container of green jello. He knows he won’t be able to stomach it.

He flexes his good hand and the IV wiggles in his skin, making it twinge. He picks up his phone again, and there’s the blinking light of 20 more messages from his boss. Her texts get more and more frantic, riddled with typos. And then there’s the other message.

He tears his eyes away from it, looking to the ceiling. No, don’t. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about any of this.

The television looks like an inviting distraction. He picks up the remote, clicks the power button, and the room flashes in bright flickering lights. The first channel is news, a man with a drab suit, mouth flapping about.

Captions, he thinks to himself, captions.

He clicks around until he hits a nature documentary, and he decides he’d rather go without them. A happy gazelle hops around for several minutes before being pounced on by a leopard.

The more he watches, the more he zones out, and it all becomes a blurry mess of colors and lights. With the fluorescent glow hurting his eyes, and without the sound he’s unfocused, like the entire room is a television that he’s just not looking at right. He hums to himself to get somewhat grounded.

Despite his best efforts to stay stupid, the thoughts start to worm their way in. What would he even do now? Where would he go? Jamie didn’t have any money, and he’d be kicked out of his apartment, considering he blew it up. No family, nothing of his own, a broken body.

He pushes his phone away as it vibrates again.

It wasn’t like he could work there anymore, either. Couldn’t exactly serve coffee with one arm, he was already a clumsy mess with two. Say goodbye to latte art.

His chest is thumping, and the room dances in moving pictures. The tightness in his throat is becoming a familiar feeling. He sits there and lists off all the things he would never be able to do, each one a sickening stab. Late nights playing video games with Hana, listening to Lucio’s new songs, hearing that voice. The tears are softer now, but the pain in his gut is sharp, eyes sore and red. Feeling sorry for himself is all he has left to do.

It feels like the worst timing in the world for the door to open, and there is Lucio, Hana, and his boss, looking at him with varying degrees of horror, and he’s trying to hold back the burning tears but they just roll down his face anyway.

Lucio breaks into a short sprint to get to his side, and there’s a moment of hesitation as he turns his head to look at the bandages crawling up his shoulder, turns just as quickly to look Jamie in the eye. His arms are up like he’s trying to figure out what to do, and he figures it out, slamming into him with a terrified and desperate embrace, already crying. Hana stands behind him, and seems to be comforting Lucio more than Jamie.

“I’m fine,” Jamie tells them, but he’s wrong. “Cut it out, Lucio.”

Lucio proceeds to babble a mile a minute, not once loosening his grip, tight and soggy. He can’t help but smile; everything seems easier with the two of them by his side.

“That guy was asking about you,” Hana says, and it’s quick and he almost can’t read her lips fast enough. It’s not like she knows. She rubs Lucio’s back as he sobs and pulls Jamie against him harder. “We didn’t tell him.”

He mulls that over in his head for a moment, lets it really sink in. The thought of that man coming into the shop, looking for him, being concerned enough to actually ask, turns his smile meek. He’d made an impression, got his attention, made him notice.

He presses his hand over Lucio’s hair, and his chest swells with things he isn’t sure of.  
His boss is always one to take charge of any situation. She strides in with purpose, head held high, long coat flapping behind her. She is pulling Lucio off him with thin gentle fingers, murmuring something, and Lucio’s tears are disgusting and genuine.

The way she sits at the edge of the bed and stares at him does something terrible to his heart. The end of her hijab tickles his arm as she reaches forward to touch his cold wet cheek.

He watches her mouth move, but he can’t read the words. She’s speaking in Arabic, and the sweet love in her eye makes his body tremble and have him in shambles.

“I can’t hear ya,” he cries out, and there are two hands on his face now, warm, wise. She tilts his head up, and the tears spill over her fingers.

“Hush,” she says, and the vibrations purr against his jaw. She has a sober smile, and she looks at him like he’s her favorite child. “Stay strong.”

It does him in. He squeezes his eyes shut tight until he sees stars, and his teeth lock together in an ugly grimace as the tremors rock his shoulders. She rubs a thumb under one of his eyes and hums at him, and he feels it through his whole body.

He isn’t strong.

“Troublemaker,” she says, and she is smiling devilishly, “You always make me worry.”

He doesn’t know how long she’s there, letting him cry it out, but it’s enough time for Angela to walk in and marvel at the chaos. She calls out something, his boss’s name, Ana. The old woman turns to face her, smiling with crinkly lips.

She stays sitting beside him, but a hand slips from his sticky face and presses into his palm gently. She is addressing the doctor, who looks like she’s seen a ghost, and nodding her head curtly to Lucio and Hana, who give him quick upset glances before leaving the room. Angela closes the door behind them, and he feels like he’s going to be euthanized with how dangerous it felt in here with them. Straight faces, furrowed brows. Maybe he wouldn’t make it out of here alive.

His boss grips his hand more firmly as she speaks to the doctor, and it’s all too fast for him to catch. They must know each other from somewhere.

Angela rounds his bed, sitting on the other side by his bum arm, and he feels trapped by them both. He gulps in a breath. Now everything was getting serious, and he wonders if he can take it right now. His head is still buzzing with thoughts of a concerned construction worker who’s missing his afternoon coffee and a text message that he needs to plan carefully.

Angela hands him her clipboard, and it looks like she’s actually typed out their conversation. It’s as convenient as it is strange. The page lists what his treatments are, prescriptions, when to take them. Physical therapy. And there’s the words he keeps seeing, bold and all encompassing:

Permanent hearing loss.

Jamie thinks now would be a nice time to cry, but he’s done plenty of that already. He feels the pang in his whole body, feels his throat get tight like he’s going to start any second, but he wills it away with a sharp breath and grips the clipboard hard. The IV stings.

He looks at Angela and waits, but she is hesitant and frowning, like she doesn’t want to tell him. He understands.

“You won’t be able to use sign language,” she mouths, leaning forward to inspect his arm. She presses calm fingers to it and it barely hurts. “Maybe a few words, but you need two hands for most.”

His boss leans forward as well, running a hand through his messy hair, around the bandages. He’s starting to feel rather babied by the soft motherly touches. His boss tilts his head toward her.

“I knew a boy, once,” she says, and there’s a nostalgic twinkle in her eye, “Lost his arm too, right up to the shoulder. Now he’s got a fancy prosthetic, made him real popular. We can get you one.”

“Gran,” he starts, and she hates that name, “Ain’t nothin’ gonna fix me.”

She frowns and says something he doesn’t know, a pet name maybe. “I wouldn’t give up so easy.”

“I can’t afford it,” he says, and it barely leaves his mouth. He glances at Angela, and she’s frowning too. She knows he can’t afford any of this. The frustration swirls in his belly.

“You think I will leave you out on the streets?” His boss smiles at him. “I don’t have much these days, but I’ve got a shop in need of good workers.”

“I can’t!” comes out forcefully, startling the women and himself, and his nub of an arm lifts off the bed just a bit before Angela presses it back down. “I can’t do nothin’ anymore!”

His boss is giving him a warning look now, and he clenches his teeth, biting back the words running laps in his brain. She is always perceptive, and he hates it. “You aren’t dead. That means you can do plenty.”

He wants to tell her she’s wrong, because he can count the things he can do right on one hand, the only hand. He wants to tell her he’s tired of thinking about this, about what he’s going to do, and none of this has any substance, but the thought sends a painful jolt to his guts.

“You think running a business is easy, boy? There’s always paperwork. Don’t need two hands for that.” She crosses her legs like this is a casual conversation, but her face is still stern and threatening. “Get started slow. You’ll get used to it. Trust me.”

He doesn’t want to get used to it, but it’s stupid to think that. No amount of fighting is going to bring back his hand, his hearing. He has to get on with it.

Angela touches his busted arm at the elbow to get his attention, and she has it. “We can release you as soon as the swelling goes down, maybe another day or two. You will have to come back in to have the stitches removed, and the schedule for your therapy sessions is listed here.” She taps the clipboard. “I know you think you can’t afford it, but we will work with you. We will not turn you away.”

He nods slowly to appease them, and he’s clearly unconvinced. Mercy lets out a visible sigh, patting his arm again. “We will give you time. Rest.”

His boss leans forward to press a kiss to his forehead, lips moving strangely, saying something exotic again, and stands with Angela. The doctor places the other clipboard, the one full of blank paper, onto his lap. Practice.

When they open the door, two bright young faces peek in, and Lucio is still looking upset, probably because that hug wasn’t long enough. His boss is saying something to them, and they’re suddenly all slouched shoulders and pouting lips. It’s not like they could close the cafe all day to hang out with him here. They’re yelling goodbyes at him and Hana’s blowing kisses and shooting finger guns before they’re pushed out of the way. They’ll be back, Jamie thinks, and he’ll have to tell them. 

The door closes, and being alone is both refreshing and haunting

Time passes. It’s cruel and unrelenting, and the room is quickly shaping into some sort of peach-colored jail cell. The television has lost its novelty, and the clipboard in his lap is heavy, the pen rolling between his fingers smoothly. This was inevitable.

He writes the words that have been playing on repeat since he read them. The letters are all uneven, scribbly, and he never had the best handwriting anyway. It reminds him of kid drawings you’d always see on refrigerators. 

_You weren’t in today_

He starts to write it again, and this time it looks a little nicer. It feels weird to be moving his arm like this, not sure where to put his thumb on the pen. It slips and wobbles in his grip, but with each letter he’s thinking of big hands and thick lips and smoldering eyes that make him feel crushed and warm.

He writes it a third time, and he’s getting it. It still looks like shit, but he’s getting it. And there’s a looseness in his chest, unraveling that tight anger that’s been there since he opened his eyes to find he wasn’t the same. A looseness that makes his hand still against the paper, makes it drift down to the phone in his lap, and start typing. He’s shaking, but he’s exhilarated all the way to the bone. He presses the send button, and it’s like a shot of espresso straight into his blood.

-Sorry about that. Not feeling too good.-

He thinks hard. It wasn’t very romantic, wasn’t original or funny or cool. That’s okay.

Get started slow. Practice.

Maybe this wouldn’t lead to a conversation. Maybe he’d see the reply and shrug and never address it again. Suddenly the thrill is coming down hard, and he scrambles to fix it. He couldn’t let this slip away. His fingers press about the keys rapidly.

-U miss me?-

And he’s fucking done it. He’s crossed that bridge, and the thrill has turned into an all out morbid fear. He bites at his thumbnail as he stares at the screen, bright in the dimmed lights, waiting for a response. It’s only been seconds, and the longer he looks at it, the more the words sting. He should have spent more time calculating this, making a plan, figuring this out. He’d gotten too excited, and now he refuses to blink, afraid to miss it. Get it together, Jamison, it’s not like he’s glued to his phone like you are.

But it still vibrates and blinks all the same, and he’s wrong; there’s a response. The breath holds in his lungs, refuses to come out, and his eyes are burning hot.

-Maybe-

He drops his phone like it’s molten steel, and his toes curl under the sheets. He wasn't ready for this. This is different, off. He didn't expect something so absolutely cheeky. He can barely get the guy to look at him, let alone be open enough to say something like that. The word “fuck” resonates in his head, out his mouth, but he’s grinning with big white teeth as he picks up the pen again and gets to work.

_Maybe_

He writes it over and over until it doesn’t even look like a word anymore, until his fingers ache and pop. He’s drowning on the high of it, in a world unique to this moment and it’s just him and the phone. He snaps it back up into his hand, and the trembling doesn’t stop, can’t stop, won’t. He presses keys while his body shivers in a delight it’s never known before.

-I’ll take that as a yes-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The fluff is on its way. 
> 
> Thank you for the nice comments! It really keeps me going.
> 
> Froggyflan.tumblr.com


	6. 20 Questions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is short fluffy setup. The good stuff will be in the next chapter. Soon!!!!

It only gets better.

His time in the hospital is coming to an end. Angela brings him every meal, staying to watch him practice. She tries to teach him some sign language, but it’s not really sticking. He remembers “thank you” and “sorry”. He can’t imagine that’s going to come in handy. He’d have to find someone who knew sign language. Hana and Lucio would learn for him, maybe his boss. It’s not like he knew anyone else.

Learning to write like it's the first time is slow and embarrassing, but the awkwardness dies away with every word. It’s sloppy and foreign, and it’s painful to grip the pen. He eventually gets the IV out, and it feels good to be able to move around, to curl up under the sheets and cherish his phone like it’s all a dream.

The texts keep coming. One moment he thinks he’s replying too quickly, needs to back off so he doesn’t annoy the guy, and the next he’s overwhelmed by the speed he’s receiving them. It doesn’t matter what time he sends a message. He’ll get a reply within minutes.

He’s talking to a stranger, and by all means it should be basic conversation material: small talk, pleasantries, stupid questions. But it doesn’t feel like a stranger. He’s been addicted to him for months, and it’s like they’re friends who haven’t talked in awhile. It’s open and genuine, funny, wonderful. It makes his chest fizzle something warm and delicate. He kicks his feet under the covers, and it feels like he’s back in high school. Younger, dumber, crushing hard and nothing to do about it.

He asks if he’s getting better. Jamie lies, tells him he’ll be back soon. He hasn’t thought of a way to tell him yet. He doesn’t want to ruin this right now. It’s all he has in this boring place, in this empty quiet world. He’s fine.

-Your friends don’t know how to make a flat white-, the man says, and each letter he types trembles over and over. 

-That place would fall apart without me-

A moment later, he gets the response. -Haha-

Things are too surreal like this. He thinks at any moment the conversation will die naturally, stop the topic and just fade out. Maybe both of them would be waiting for the other to respond, and it would turn into a stalemate. He doesn’t think the guy would be so willing to talk to him, so brash and cool. He jokes and says things he would never expect to come from such a scary dude, nice things. Easy things, like he’s comfortable.

Jamie waits two days to ask his name.

He lets the question linger on the tips of his fingers for hours, afraid. This would be the question that tipped the scale, made things different. Was it too much to ask? He just wanted to stop thinking about what to call him. That guy? Hot guy. Big. He tries different names in his head. John, probably. It’s always John.

The send button pings under his thumb, and he lays his head on the pillow with a flop. The screen hurts his eyes, and when he looks up, the rest of the room is blurry. He blinks rapidly to clear it, but he’s been staring for hours. It’s not going to go away anytime soon.

He gets his reply, his phone buzz-buzzing in his tight grip.

-Haven’t you asked me that before?-

Jamie scoffs, and he’s got a sweet feeling in his gut. Before he can even think of something smart to respond with, it buzzes again. 

-It's Mako-

The first thing Jamie does is take a deep breath. Mako. He's never heard that before. He doesn't know where it hails from, but it probably explains his tan skin and heavy features. The second thing he does is search the name on the Internet. It immediately pulls up pictures of big toothy sharks. A Maori word. Another search gives him pictures of thick men with tattooed faces.

Interesting, he thinks. Amazing. 

He sits up and throws the blanket back to write it. Mako. Big swooping letters. The K is uneven.

Curiosity pecks at him, and Jamie wants to ask him everything. Was he born on an island? What was it like living there? Does he speak the language? The questions seem daunting as he types them, too much all at once. He clicks the backspace and starts over.

-I like it-

Stupid, he thinks, real stupid. How was he going to keep the conversation going when he kept answering like that? He fixes it quickly. 

-Where's it from?-

He closes his eyes, the brightness of the screen burning through his lids, and wonders. Palm trees, clean sand, blue seas. He’s never been outside the city, only seen starry skies in pictures. The thought of salty breezes and beaches excites him. The phone buzzes.

-New Zealand-

New Zealand. Jamie writes it, and the Z is difficult, his fingers putting pressure in the wrong places. It comes out sort of sideways.

-Do u miss it?-

He clicks the send button. Assuming he even cared about his heritage, if he’s even from there. He doesn’t seem like a patriotic person. Jamie writes more. Mako. New Zealand. Island. Ocean. Shark.

-I do-

He hates the way that looks on his screen. He shouldn’t have asked.

-I’m sorry-

-Don’t be-

They’re at that standstill he was afraid of. What do you say to that? He’s suddenly feeling vulnerable, and he’s got a nasty taste in his mouth. Jamie wants to know more, but he doesn’t want to make him any more homesick. Another day, he thinks. There will be plenty of time. Take it slow. He types without thinking.

-What’s ur favorite color?-

He smacks the phone against his leg. What kind of a question was that? What is this, the sharing circle? He’s going to think you’re-

-Pink. Ask me a better question-

Jamie laughs, and he feels it boom in his chest.

-Pink? Really?-

-That’s not a better question-

-What’s a better question?-

-Not that-

-What are u wearing?-

-Try again-

The flirting is getting to his head, but his dumb smile begins to fade as his fingers ache from typing, and he watches them stretch about. He is testing the waters now.

-Do u know sign language?-

It’s a moment before he responds. He feels like he’s being dishonest with Mako. It’s not like he totally lied, just fibbed a little. He couldn’t hide it forever.

-No. Should I?-

Jamie feels the smile coming back already. It was so easy with him.

-Yeah. It’s pretty neat-

He’s thinking of something else to ask him in this game they're playing when the phone vibrates hard. A phone call from his landlord. Jamie ends it immediately, and is already texting him a genuine “sorry”.

It’s not going to help. He knows that. In a few moments he’s going to get a scathing reply about how much he had really fucked up. Paperwork and damages and bills. He’s going to be sapped for every penny for that big beautiful hole he left in the wall. The window probably bust open too, the floor charred. Everything would need to be rebuilt.

They start pouring in, and it’s just one long wall of words, too big to fit into one text. Curse words are used extensively, impressively, and Jamie’s starting to feel nauseous. He can barely skim over them without wanting to just give up and not respond, like he’s been doing since he got here. Being responsible wasn’t one of his many talents. His phone keeps on buzzing, over and over, and each one hurts.

Out on the streets again. It’d been awhile, not since he was in high school. He’d been a scrappy little shit, dropping out and running away like he had somewhere to go. He was always good at running. It made it easy to steal what he needed, stuffing his pockets and mouth with food before bouncing faster than a speeding ticket. Probably would have been a track star if he’d stayed.

Living under bridges hadn’t been terrible. All he needed was a blanket and he could sleep anywhere, on anything. He liked the sound of the traffic over his head, the rumble of concrete, the smell of gasoline and oil. He didn’t have to listen to anyone or do anything he didn’t want to. He could go wherever and do whatever and no one could catch him.

After his first winter, when he’d nearly died in the snow, Jamie decided it wasn’t such a good idea after all. Pride wouldn’t let him go home, but he pushed himself to give a damn. After the successful heist of a clothing store and breaking into a high school gymnasium for a shower, he looked as normal as a scrawny teenager could, and was ready to get a job and somewhere to sleep. And he did, with some difficulty. Slowly he started earning money, enough to buy food instead of steal it, enough for a monthly motel, and it started coming together.

As a child, people sympathized, wanted to give him a second chance. As an adult, nothing would come to him easy. Especially not in his new condition.

Jamie taps the pen to his clipboard nervously. No, not again. He’s trying to think, but he can’t with the phone vibrating on his lap. It shakes him hard, and he’s swiping it open, ignoring the thirteenth text about how he’s human garbage. And there’s Mako.

-How are you feeling?-

His fingers curl around the phone like it’s more precious than anything on Earth. He’s okay. Something clicks in his brain, and he’s caught in a whirlwind.

There’s a terrible idea running through his head. Terrible. But it would force him to wake up and take control for once. It would be rocky at first, but if he was lucky, he could smooth it all over. He just needs more time; A head start.

His shoulders shake with hesitation as he types. Take the plunge.

-I need ur help with something-


	7. Slow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eyyy I heard you like Mako. He's in this.

Fidgety.

Angela’s thrilled for him. It’s his last day and his arm is still numbed up, but she’s given him enough pills to last him the whole damn year. He finally gets to wear his own clothes, and they’re sort of dirty and a bit burnt at the edges, but he already feels more comfortable. Without the bandages around his head, he can finally run his fingers through his mussed hair, touch his ears.

He taps his fingers on them, just to be sure. Nothing.

She keeps talking at him about how he’s going to be fine. It’s going to be strange getting used to things, but that’s part of healing, she says. It’s exciting, she says.

He’s terrified.

Sending Mako those texts had absolutely ruined him. He had to give him the address to the hospital. He didn’t tell him why he was at the hospital, but he’d given himself up. He couldn’t tell him over the phone. He needed to do it in person. The response had been swift, short, and cold.

-I’ll be there at noon-

Mako hadn’t texted him since. That night had been worse than all the others. The impending dread kept him awake. He spent hours thinking of what he’d have to say, how he’d say it. When he closed his eyes to will himself to sleep, all he could see was that big face with the scar and heavy jaw, tearing him to pieces with just a look. Pity, maybe. Distrust. He couldn’t do it. Sleep never came.

Angela is mothering him, and he enjoys it the best he can with the fear bubbling in his stomach. He stands by the door as she pecks through the room and starts pointing to the labels on prescription bottles, holding them up to his face to read the directions. She’s at his side and runs a finger over lines of instructions, dates, warnings, advice. She finally wears through her pile of papers until all that’s left is a little formal letter with his name on it. From the hesitant twitch of her fingers and the furrowing of her brows, he already knows what it is.

Jamie holds out his hand to take it, and her shoulders drop as she sighs.

“You don’t need to pay it all up front,” she says, and he hates the way she tries to smile but can’t. “I have made sure of it.”

“Why’re ya being so nice to me? Ya got tons of other patients.”

“You think I am only nice to you?” She looks sly now. “I am a very good doctor.”

She escorts him down the halls, and he admires how busy she is. People greet her nonstop and she’s signing things and checking clipboards at every door they pass. When they hit the elevator, she stops to pat out her scrubs and tuck her golden hair behind her ear, looking prim and proper despite the chaos.

“Anybody ever tell ya you’re an angel?”

“Every day,” she answers.

When they reach the lobby, brightly lit and modern, he marvels at the big glass windows and the shuffling of people and papers and the sweet smell of cinnamon. It’s strange to watch the bustle of people on mute, like he can’t gauge their speed without the sound. Isolation had kept him away from the odd feeling. Angela sees him trying to make heads or tails of it, and she takes hold of his hand and shakes it curtly. She’s glowing like sunshine and he’s going to miss it. “You’re going to do just fine, Mr. Fawkes. Don’t worry.”

This isn’t what he’s worrying about, but he smiles at her still. “Thanks, doc.”

She hands him the plastic bag full of drugs and papers, nodding to him one last time with hopeful blue eyes. She says something quick and slurred, and he can’t catch it. A foreign word, like his boss. A goodbye. He appreciates whatever it is.

She leaves him with a gentle wave, and the world dims a little. It feels like he’s watching a movie in fast forward, and no one can see him. People are moving all around and here he is, standing still in the center.

The massive clock on the wall is nearly pointing to noon, and he takes a deep breath to tune out the movements. He’d planned this all out. Laying awake and staring at the ceiling had let him piece it together. Mako would get here and he’d give him that look that would kill him, and he’d have to explain himself. He’d stand up straight and puff up his chest and be brave.

“Look, I know I shoulda told ya, I was just,” he pauses because it hurts, “Scared.”

He’s fine.

A girl walks up to the receptionist desk, flowers in her arms. Jamie starts to smell the complimentary coffee, the air fresheners stuck high on the walls. He sits on the dark boxy furniture and watches the cars move about aimlessly in the parking lot. They blur together and it’s starting to get overwhelming. The leather of the seat is sticking to his sweaty palm.

It’s easy to zone out when the world is quiet and you’re the only one in it. All he has to do is close his eyes and suddenly there isn’t anything at all. Black and motionless, nothing else. Jamie feels his heart beat loudly, and he hums it into submission. If he opens his eyes again, everything will surge together in a puddle of colors.

“I didn’t wanna bother ya. Ain’t nothin’ ya gotta worry about.”

He thinks his ears may be ringing, or he’s just imagining it. It’s shrill and piercing. If he remembers a sound, it’s almost good enough. A rough voice, a deep tremor. It calms him down, even though it had only ever excited him before. It pulls him deeper into his black box jail cell.

“I’m fine.”

Something pushes into his shoulder, heavy and warm. Fingers. He shoots up so fast his head spins and he’s gasping for air like he’s forgotten how to breathe.

Mako watches him curiously, thick frowning lips and narrow eyes. Of course he doesn’t know how long he’s been standing there. Of course.

Something horrible stirs in his whole body like he’s stuck to the floor and cars are barreling toward him at full speed. He can’t move, and all he can do is look him dead in the eye. All the things he’d wanted to say fade out and all he can think of is how he hasn’t seen this face in nearly a week, and it’s all coming back to him how absolutely fucking lovesick he is.

Jamie’s mouth moves, but nothing comes, and he can’t look away. He sees the way Mako’s eyes flash and change, realizing he’s not all there, that he’s not right, not in the slightest. Their stare breaks when Mako looks down at his arm, at the bandages, at the twitching little stump. He looks back up at Jamie, and he doesn’t need to say anything, won’t. Here comes the look that wouldn’t let him sleep, the one that his brain had thought up for him and kept nestled back there just in case he forgot what an idiot he was. It’s not quite as terrible as he imagined, more blank than anything else. He looks confused, just a bit frustrated, annoyed. It hasn’t sunk in yet.

“I,” he starts, and it’s torture to force it out. Mako is waiting for his explanation, but he knows he can’t do it. All his words are gone. His plan is out the window and Jamie’s at the breaking point. “I’m sorry.”

They’re trapped in a Mexican standoff. He thinks there isn’t anything in this world that can make this moment any less sickening. Jamie presses his hand against the stump. It’s so painful, but it keeps him standing.

“I fucked up.”

He inhales sharply and he can practically hear it. Mako is still so impassive and it’s just making it worse. It’s a long burning moment before the big man shifts gently, tense, and his lips part to say something. There’s immediate panic in Jamie’s bones, down to every muscle he’s got, and he has to stop him.

“I blew out me ears,” he blurts out and it’s too difficult to keep bottled up in his chest. “I can’t hear ya. Ain’t never gonna hear ya.”

At least that gets half a reaction. He imagines Mako thinking back on that text message, and the realization shows. His expression is turning grave, frowning deeper and Jamie would give anything to know what he was thinking. There’s a flicker of pity in his eyes, and Jamie wants to look away in shame, but they’re still trained to each other. He’d expected it, not sure why he thought it’d be different. The embarrassment is sharp in his skin.

A big hand raises to his chest and his fist turns in a slow wide circle. Sorry.

Jamie’s starstruck. He had promised himself he wouldn’t cry. His lip trembles as he tries to pull himself together, but it rips out of him anyway. A sob chokes it’s way up and he tries his best to stuff it back in, swiping the tears away with the heel of his palm. Something about it makes it feel good, like it’s okay to cry. His throat burns and his body tremble as he tries to get it under control, but it doesn’t hurt, not like it normally does. All the worries start to drain out of him, and it’s a relief he hasn’t felt since this all started. It’s morphing into something nearly pleasant. Maybe it’s the way Mako is looking at him like he’s done something wrong, and it makes him hiccup out a laugh. Mako doesn’t move.

“Ya big lug,” he whispers, and he sniffs through a smile. “Ya a real sweetheart under all that gruff, ain’tcha?”

Now Mako is the one looking embarrassed, but he shrugs those wide shoulders like he doesn’t care. He obviously does.

“I’m good at reading lips, ya know,” he murmurs as he wipes at his raw eyes, his voice shaky. “Or ya can text me. That’d take a little longer, though. Kinda weird.”

Mako nods after a moment, and the tension is still lingering. Jamie can’t shake the watery smile on his face, not with Mako here with him. He’s finally comfortable again. Months of pining have come to a head, and he’s okay. Everything is okay. He sniffs and clears his throat, leaning forward to nudge the big guy in the gut with his good elbow.

“So ya gonna help me out, huh? Let’s get on with it!”

Mako gives him a hesitant look, but starts with awkward steps toward the automatic doors. Jamie follows with a loving grin.

Summer is starting to die away and the air that hits him as he exits the building is just warm, not too hot, and the freshness has him reeling with exhilaration. He takes a long inhale and it feels crisp in his lungs. He walks behind Mako, admiring his heavy gait and fluffy ponytail that bounces with each step. He’s nearly close enough to touch, and he needs to stop before it gets creepy. Slow down, you idiot.

“Where’d ya park, mate? Ya got a nice car?”

Mako looks over his shoulder at him briefly, but he doesn’t say anything, making his way to the far side of the parking lot. Jamie couldn’t imagine him having a tiny sports car or anything like that, wouldn’t fit. Maybe a big Jeep or a Hummer. A huge black Cadillac like a kingpin.

He’s surprised to see him walk up to a big metal beast of a motorcycle, long handlebars and sleek chrome. It looks like a cherished piece of silver, clean and shiny. The tires are dark as oil, like they’re brand new, and it fits the man far too well.

“Hooley dooley,” he mutters, pressing a hand to the gas tank carefully. His face looked back at him in the reflection. “Ya got a hog!”

Mako nods at him as he swings a leg over the side, and the bike hustles down low to accommodate the weight. To say that turned Jamie on was an understatement. He can barely contain a gasp, and he bites his lip. Thank God Mako’s too busy starting the thing to look at him. It rumbles to life, Jamie can feel the ground shake under his feet, and he is overwhelmed by the power and intimidating arousal settling in his belly. Dear lord.

“How, uh,” and he’s trying to cough out the knot in his tongue, “Where do I sit?”

His voice must be small over the roar of the monster, and he’s about ready to keel over. Mako nods his head to the passenger, no, the bitch seat behind him, and Jamie already knows where this is going.

“Mate, I can’t exactly, uh, hold on back there.” He waves his bandaged arm, and his face is cherry red, can feel it up to his ears. He knows where he’s going to have to sit.

Mako takes a hand off the handlebars and holds it open toward him, his fingers curling together in a quick jerk, a come hither.

This is how he dies, he thinks. This is how he ruins everything.

He shuffles closer, and once he’s standing by the bike he can feel it vibrating and purring, but it’s nothing compared to the thumping in his chest at the thought of sitting between Mako’s legs. His thighs are thick and strong wrapped around the bike, and he scoots back a bit so Jamie won’t be sitting entirely on the gas tank.

Mako is watching him expectantly, waiting for him to get on. Jamie takes a deep breath to reassure himself.

He takes hold of the handlebar, and it’s difficult to lift his leg up without the other hand to keep balance. Mako’s eyes are on him, making sure he doesn’t fall over or hurt himself, or maybe he’s just worried about the bike. Whatever the case, he likes the feel of Mako’s attention.

He slides over the seat, smooth, and the vibrations tickle him everywhere. He’s not sure where to put his feet, doesn’t want to accidentally kick a wheel and shave his toes off. He feels Mako shift behind him and oh, oh god he’s opening his legs wider to press Jamie’s feet against his ankles, anchoring them to the sides.

Deep breath. In, out.

It’s too damn much. He’s pressed against Mako tightly, his round paunch curved against his spine, and Jamie leans forward to grasp where the handlebars come together.

He’s bent over a goddamn motorcycle with his ass pressed to the one guy in the world he wants to bang into oblivion.

He feels something underneath them click, and the bike tilts sideways, making him jolt upright. He’s never ridden a motorcycle before, and he feels like he’s going to fall off at any moment, even with the perfect hulking body pushing his down. He grips the handlebars tight as they start moving, the revving of the engine pulsing through him. It’s strange starting out, rolling into the turn of the wheel, and Mako leans them over to make it move to his will. Once they’re pointed in the right direction, he feels the wind pick up immediately, moving swiftly, and Mako’s legs shift up off the ground.

It’s hard to breathe, once they’re flying at top speed down the road, and he has to take it through his nose carefully. His hair whips around his face and the tips feel sharp like needles. He has to close his eyes or they’ll start tearing up from the dryness. Instead, he feels the warm slippery metal in his fingers, focuses on the feeling of Mako so close he could just turn around and kiss him and he’s completely entranced with the idea of making this a regular thing.

He gets comfy, the hard tremble of the motorcycle is soothing and the wind feels icy the faster they go. It’s exciting and wonderful, and he’s brave enough to turn his head to look up at the man holding him close, big arms caging him in safely. It's all a beautiful dream he'd like to get lost in. Mako’s focused on the road ahead, but when he sees his head turn, he glances down at him for just a single precious second and that’s enough for Jamie.

It’s okay. Take it slow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Froggyflan.tumblr.com


	8. Generous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the beta, [Scrunchy](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrunchles/pseuds/Scrunchles). You're a gem!!!
> 
> Fluff fluff fluff fluff

He should be waking up any second now.

The bike hums underneath them, and the body pressed to his is warm and steady. Every shift between them is a beautiful, gentle touch. When Mako moves his leg up and down at a stoplight, it caresses Jamie’s thigh innocently, thick denim rubbing against thin cargo shorts, and it makes him delirious. If he concentrates hard enough, he can feel Mako’s heartbeat against his back, a deep thumping drowning in the smooth vibrations of the bike. There’s a strange flat nub pressed into the small of Jamie’s back, and after rattling his brain, he realizes Mako has an outie belly button. It makes him smile wide, his face already aching from stretching his lips so tight.

It’s all so calming, but he’s spring loaded and nervous. It’s a lot to take in. He feels like he should be talking to fill the awkward silence of the ride, but he sputters out a laugh when he remembers everything is an awkward silence now. Mako must not have heard it over the engine, or at least he hopes he hadn't, and they just keep on rolling. 

Jamie leans back against him, loving the way Mako’s belly gives in so easily. He imagines Mako returning the gesture, pressing closer in response, and suddenly it’s real. He feels the wonderful pressure increase on his spine, the big body meeting him halfway, thick knuckles curling tighter around the handlebars in front of them. Jamie can’t believe it, and his mouth opens as if he should laugh or cry or say something, but all that comes is a bug lodging itself in his throat at 45 miles an hour. He hacks and tries to cough it out, but it’s too late, he’s swallowed it, and he lets out a disgusted groan. Mako is laughing, he feels it in the rumble of his stomach. Jamie heaves an angry growl. Moment ruined.

They travel down familiar roads, well worn by years of traffic and neglect. They’re close to downtown and all its grime and notoriety. Jamie wonders if Mako knows this side of the city as well as he does, the sketchy dive bars and dirty clubs. Mako looks pretty straight laced, he thinks, too old to be a patron of such establishments. He wouldn't enjoy the loud beat of dance music or young people trying to impress each other. He looks more like the kind of guy who spends his nights falling asleep on the couch reading a paperback novel. For a moment he thinks of how boring and crotchety that sounds, but then he thinks of how much he would love to be curled up right there with him, resting his head under his chin, sinking into his soft belly until he falls asleep to the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes. It's enough to make his shoulders hunch and his brain go soupy. He'll have plenty of time to play out his daydreams soon enough.

The closer they are to their destination, the antsier he gets. It's not going to end well. But having Mako with him gives him ease of mind, a little safety. He sure looks like a bodyguard: mean looking, intimidating, big as ever. Nobody would mess with Jamie if he was around, not unless they wanted to meet ol’ lefty. The tattoos on his fingers are faded into tan skin, fuzzy and dull at the edges. Maybe they're from when he was a bouncer or a biker or something equally grizzled and dangerous. Maybe he had an exciting life before he started falling asleep to books.

Mako is tense behind him as they go deeper into the heart of the city. He must know this place. Jamie wonders if he’s worried about his bike getting stolen or messed up. The beast really is a fine creature; pretty and perfect, unlike everything else here. The buildings are old and misused, years of selfish tenants and bad business. Red brick is black with dirt and burns, colorful with blue and green graffiti. Jamie may or may not have added to the collection around town, but at least his weren’t tasteless illegible tags. Some people just didn’t have any artistic merit.

Jamie is suddenly very embarrassed living here. Normally he wouldn’t give a shit, it’s not like he had many friends coming to visit. Lucio and Hana frequently came to the clubs and parties hosted downtown, and usually crashed at his place for the night so they wouldn’t have to stumble home in the dark. They aren’t ones to judge him. If anything, they’re glad for the resource. But Mako is different. He’s someone new, impressionable. He’d been tip-toeing around him for what felt like ages, and now he’s dragging him into this filthy cesspool. He bets Mako lives in a nice big house with a green front lawn and a backyard with a swimming pool. Definitely not here.

His apartment building is just up ahead. He takes a deep breath despite the wind in his face. He has to work himself up, make sure he doesn’t fall to pieces in front of Mako. That would be the worst thing-- even worse than facing his landlord. He can do things himself. He doesn’t need Mako to fix it. Jamie can get by on his own because that’s how it’s always been.

He rolls his shoulders absent mindedly, and they bump against Mako’s stomach. Mako nudges him right back with his elbow, hands not leaving the bike, and Jamie would say that was downright playful. He turns to grin up at him, and Mako’s wearing that trademark half smile, half snarl that Jamie should really find a name for. It’s impossible to tell which emotion he’s trying to convey; his lips are up and down all at once. Maybe Mako thinks that’s what a smile should look like, and the thought makes him laugh out loud. He pats Mako’s arm to assure him he’s not laughing at him, really he isn’t. Mako doesn’t look offended in the least.

They roll up to the visitor parking, and Jamie can finally feel his face again. He reaches up to poke his frozen cheeks, and they’re stiff and numb. His hair is a complete mess, but that’s his normal style anyway, nothing new. Mako parks the bike, setting the kickstand up with his foot and leaning the bike to the side. Jamie gets that unbalanced, wobbly feeling again like he’s going to fall over, but Mako’s hands wrap around his waist and start to lift him off the seat. He feels his heart trying to burst out of his chest at the feel of it. Mako’s hands are so damn big. The fingers lay in a neat line from his chest to his hips, and he’s pretty sure he could lift him with one hand if he wanted to. It’s over as quickly as it had come, his feet touching the ground and the warm fingers leaving him to lock up the bike. Jamie shivers when Mako isn’t looking.

The apartment building is as shabby as the rest of the city, dirty and busy. The tenants are loitering about in the courtyard, bratty children running around and dogs barking. Jamie feels the embarrassment coming to a head as they pass by and he can feel them staring. Was it Jamie’s missing arm or was it Mako’s intimidating size? Whatever the case, he grits his teeth as his nerves twinge and he turns to Mako as they walk.

“Ain’t the nicest place to live, but ya know, I’ll take what I can get!”

Mako just nods. He doesn’t seem bothered by any of it. Jamie gulps back his anxieties and smiles.

His studio is on one of the higher floors. Thankfully, it’s a tall enough building to have an elevator. He’d hate to drag Mako up all those stairs. He presses the call button and they wait a short moment for it to open its doors. It’s not a very good elevator, and he’d gotten stuck in it on several occasions to no fault of his own, but it’s something. He almost wishes it would get stuck, just so it can play out like a romantic cliche. They’d be trapped for hours with nothing but themselves, nobody to bother them. Jamie snorts out a laugh and apologizes when Mako gives him a look. He laughs too much, he knows, but it’s easy and feels right.

The ride up is short, but it’s loud. Not that he can hear it, but he’s heard this elevator a thousand times before, and it’s ingrained in his head. It’s a grind of metal on metal, rusty gears and overworked cables. He just smiles at Mako like it’ll distract him from the fact that he lives in an absolute dump. He remembers the sound of the ding too, as they wrench to a stop and the doors slide open. He takes a deep breath, and his smile doesn’t falter.

“Just down the hall,” Jamie tells him, leading them out and to the left. His feet feel heavy against the carpet, but he holds his head high and prepares himself.

Big cardboard boxes line the hallway, and he can see some of his things peeking over the edges, carelessly crammed in. As he reaches his door, he sees it’s halfway open. When he pushes against it, it swings all the way open and reveals the face of his landlord, dark and irritated. The man presses his hand to the door frame firmly, barring them from entering.

Jamie hates the look on his face. It’s snarky. His mouth is turned up into a sneer as he looks him over, and when his eyes wander up to Mako, he seems surprised, but unfazed. He says something, but Jamie can’t figure it out, the words all slurring together. He knows one of those words is “fuck”. Jamie sighs and he hopes it’s loud.

“I’m deaf now, Reyes, I can’t hear anything you’re saying.”

His landlord looks at him like he’s an idiot, and leans in closer. “Then read my lips: Get the fuck out of here.”

Jamie shoves against him, and his arm gives away with a jerk. He ducks around him and muscles his way into the room. He knows he’s mostly bark these days, no more bite. “I’m just here to get my things, don’t lose your shit.”

The room looks empty, just random bits and pieces scattered about on the floor. He’s sure most of it’s in the boxes out front. He turns to the shattered window covered in plastic, and he sees the burned walls and charred floorboards. There’s a sudden sickness settling in his gut as he looks over his workbench, blackened and splintered at the edges. His blood is still caked all over, large patches of it seeped into the wood of the table and floor, hundreds of drops splattered high on the outdated wallpaper, the water-spotted ceiling.

He turns away before he gets too nauseous, taking a shaky breath as he looks over at Reyes speaking to Mako as if he knew him, probably complaining about all the work he was going to have to do. Mako looks annoyed, and Jamie kind of really likes the way his eyebrows furrow hard on his face. He’s scary looking, but Reyes isn’t afraid of anything. He’d probably fought guys bigger than Mako, once upon a time.

Jamie opens his closet and finds it untouched. It would probably be the last thing his landlord touches, throwing it all in a bag and sending it to the thrift store. He fishes out his best backpack from a hat hook, drops it between his feet, and starts shoving in what he needs: His favorite shirts, some jeans, underwear, socks, a pair of sneakers. He stops to yank his cool leather jacket off a hanger and wrestle it over himself. He’d have to get the hang of getting dressed with one hand.

The backpack feels light, but it’s getting full quickly, and he hates that his entire life has to suddenly fit in a 12x2x16 inch space. He heads to his tiny bathroom to grab the essentials. He wouldn’t bother with the kitchen-- Nothing important there. But he does glance over at Reyes one last time, still too busy ranting at Mako to pay him any attention, and grabs a single baseball sized grenade he’d stashed under his now bloody, ruined desk. He’d drawn a crazy little smily face on it, and the weight of it in his hand is more comforting than anything he’s felt in a long while.

He plops it on top of his most precious possessions and zips up the pack, tossing it over his shoulder and giving the studio one last look about. He’d miss the view of the city from his window and the drunken sleepovers. He’d miss the familiar creaks of the floor and the subtle smell of smoke and gunpowder. They weren’t meaningful memories, nothing personal. The only life changing thing to ever happen was still there, reminding him with reds and blacks and the memory of cold fire.

Jamie feels the floor move slightly beneath him, and his landlord is standing in front of him, big arms crossed over his chest. Mako seems relieved that the man has stopped talking to him, but he looks apprehensive, like he thinks Reyes is going to murder Jamie. He really is a bodyguard.

“How are you going to pay for this?” His landlord says, and Jamie can barely piece it together. He readjusts the backpack on his shoulder, tense with pain and anger and he just wants to be done with this.

“Sell all my stuff.”

Reyes rolls his eyes and visibly huffs.

“Garbage. It’s gonna cost me just to get rid of it.”

“Then whatever, send me the bill.”

“You’re homeless, aren’t you?”

Jamie opens his mouth to answer, but he doesn’t have one. He hadn’t gotten this far with his plan. He just needed a ride from Mako to grab what he could and book it. Bumming off of Lucio and Hana was out of the question, they were both in college and had roommates. There wasn’t room for him anywhere. Maybe he’d have enough money to get a motel for a while.

“I’ll come back for it,” he says, as if this experience wasn’t terrible enough, he’d have to do it again. “I’ll take care of it.”

Reyes looks unconvinced. “Don’t fuck with me, kid. I’ll find you.”

Jamie feels that sick feeling making its way up his throat, and he glares back in challenge. “I ain’t a liar.”

His landlord shifts his weight and opens his mouth to say something, probably cruel and snappy, but Mako is reaching forward to grab Jamie by his empty sleeveand tugging him toward the door.

“Hey, what?” Jamie isn’t sure if he should resist or just let him do whatever it is he’s thinking. Mako pushes him out of the room and into the hallway, closing the door in his face. “What?”

He tries to open the door again, but it’s held in place, and Mako’s probably leaning on it because it doesn’t give an inch. He bangs on it instead. “Mako, what are ya doing? Come on!”

Maybe he was beating up Reyes. As funny as that would be, he didn’t want his new sorta-boyfriend-whatever-they-were to be sent to jail. It was already enough Reyes hadn’t turned him into the cops for making “art”. But Jamie had dirt on Reyes, stuff he’d found out when he was totally not snooping around his apartment, so they were even. Mako didn’t even know the guy.

“Mako, it ain’t worth it!”

Jamie presses his ear to the door as if he could hear what they were doing. 

Wait.

He’s about to kick himself for being an idiot when the door opens again, and he’s suddenly unbalanced. Mako’s already there with an open hand, catching him as he leans too far forward. Jamie’s immediately in love with the feel of his entire palm pressing against his torso, but he straightens up and stands firm.

“What were ya doing in there, mate? Ya scared me!”

Mako doesn’t answer, just pushes him back so he can leave the apartment, and Reyes is smirking over his broad shoulder.

“Well aren’t you lucky,” he says, and it makes Jamie uneasy and confused.

“What’s he talking about?”

Mako still won’t answer, just nods to Reyes and keeps pushing him down the hall. It feels like they had some secret drug deal and Jamie hates not knowing what’s going on, especially since it absolutely involved him.

He keeps trying to dig his heels into the carpet, but Mako’s too strong, keeps him moving. When they hit the elevator, Jamie blocks the door the best he can with his skinny, messed up body and looks up at Mako angrily.

“Tell me,” he demands, as if he could ever get anything out of this man. He can’t figure out the emotion on Mako’s face. He seems just as confused as Jamie is.

“If you needed to move some things, you could have said so,” he says, and Jamie realizes this is the first time he’s spoken since he learned Jamie was deaf. No, this is the first time he’s even spoken to him out loud _ever_ , excluding that embarrassing “yeah” when they met all those months ago. His thick lips are slow on purpose, knowing he needs to move them correctly for Jamie to understand, but they’re so big it looks like all the sounds string together, like he’s mumbling. “I wouldn’t have brought the bike”

Jamie’s so caught up in watching the way his lips move, wanting more than anything to hear those sloppy words tumble from his mouth, he doesn’t realize he’d changed the subject. He squares his shoulders, but he can’t stop staring. “I didn’t want to bother ya anymore than I already was.”

“You aren’t bothering me.”

He can feel his body heating up all the way to the tips of his ears, and he’s lost in the moment. It’s too easy, too nice. Mako is being too good to him, and he barely knows him.

The doors behind him slide open, and he steps back into the elevator, letting Mako in with him. He punches the ground floor button, and they make their descent.

God, Jamie wants to kiss him. He wants to touch those big dumb lips and feel the words coming from them. He wants him to talk all the time, even if he can’t read him quite right. He wants to press close, wants to feel the words deep in Mako’s chest, rumbling through his skin to seep into him. He wants it so badly.

Mako’s gaze suddenly feels predatory, but Jamie knows that’s just his libido playing tricks on him. He wants Mako to want him just as furiously as he does. Mako is being friendly, just friendly.

“I wasn’t planning on taking anything big,” Jamie finally says, “Gotta sell the rest to pay that dipshit.”

“We don’t have to come back here,” Mako answers, and it feels so nice to be told that, even if it isn’t true. Jamie wonders why Mako doesn’t ask him about the burns in his apartment, the smashed window, what happened to his damn arm, why he’s deaf. He’s too accepting of everything Jamie’s thrown at him, and it isn’t fair.

“We do. I gotta pay-”

“We don’t.”

It’s final. Mako tests him with deep brown eyes, and he hates it and adores it and he just wants it to go on forever. It’s coming together, and Jamie is starting to feel sick again.

“Did ya pay him?”

Mako doesn’t answer, and it’s obviously a yes. “Ya paid him, didn’t ya?”

“He’ll send the bill,” he says, and the doors open and he’s walking out into the courtyard, leaving Jamie gaping like a fish. He scrambles to catch up as the doors start to close on him.

“Mate, ya don’t have to do that! I’m-- I can’t--” he has to catch himself before he starts babbling, “I can’t pay ya back.”

Mako turns his head as he walks, letting Jamie read his mumbling lips. “You don’t have to.”

“Don’t say that, it ain’t right.”

There’s no response from the big man, and Jamie’s got a tight, anxious knot in his throat. It’s some sort of terrible guilt and relief and hope that’s mixing together in his blood and making him dizzy.

“Look, okay, I’m gonna owe ya a lot, then. I don’t got nothin’ to my name, but I can try.”

When they get back to the bike, Mako settling onto the seat and opening his arms for him, Jamie steps back to think. He still hadn’t gotten this far, and Mako’s generous surprise had brought his thought process to a grinding halt.

“I, um,” he starts, “I guess ya can take me to the shop and I can figure out where to go from there.”

Mako is smiling at him, that weird endearing wiggle of his lips that Jamie knows he’ll never be able to stop laughing at. Just looking at it makes him get all stupid in the head, like he wasn’t already fucked up. This is all a goddamn mess and everything is against him, but then there’s this guy --were they boyfriends yet?-- acting like he can fix it, no big deal. He just shrugs it off like he can do anything, make Jamie all better again without even trying. He’ll twist the world to his bidding, and he will make it work.

Jamie wants to kiss him _so damn badly_.

“Alright,” Mako says, and it is.


	9. Over Coffee and Tea

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to [Scrunchy](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrunchles/pseuds/Scrunchles) for fixing this mess of a chapter. I want to kiss you.
> 
> I want to kiss ALL OF YOU.

The drive to the coffee shop is short. The apartment was near enough that he could be there in less than 15 minutes if the busses were running on time. Sometimes he’d even walk there, if he was too jittery.

That same nervous feeling is clawing up his throat and seeping into his blood. What was he even going to do from here? He doesn’t have anywhere to go. He had to think of something, but he’s still too busy walking on air.

The man is right beside him as they enter the shop, but it’s like he’s not even there as Lucio and Hana intercept Jamie, dragging him further into the store and away from Mako. His neck is crushed by Lucio’s strong little arms, and Hana tugs at his ears, at his hair, poking him with her sharp pink nails. Mako watches impassively, since there was no point in trying to save him.

They’re both yelling at him, he can feel it in the vibrations of their skin, but he just laughs. He’s almost glad he can’t hear any of it, and just enjoys the physical contact. He hugs Hana around her waist and gingerly loops his stump over Lucio’s heaving shoulders as he sobs.

“I missed ya guys too!”

Hana pushes him away and smooshes a finger against his nose, making sure he was looking at her, and her lips move slow. “Gran told us you fucked up your ears! You didn’t even text us, you rat!”

She stomps on his foot, and he bites his tongue to keep the laugh in. She couldn’t hurt him even if she tried. She had about as much punch as a bunny.

“I know! I know, I’m shit. Sorry,” he tells her, and Lucio is still wrapped around his torso like a snake. “I was gonna tell ya, I just got busy.”

Hana seems unconvinced, but does turn her attention to the man still standing by the door where they left him. Mako seems so out of place in their little moment, and looks around the cafe aimlessly to busy himself. Hana stares at him before turning back to Jamie with sparkles in her eyes; mischievous and catty.

“Busy, huh?”

“Don’t,” he barks, but the laughter comes anyway. “Don’t even start.”

“Look at you, mister playboy. It’s ‘cause I gave him your phone number isn’t it?”

“Yeah, actually. I’ll tell ya about it later.”

Hana is all smiles now, tugging at Lucio’s firm hold around Jamie’s ribs. “Lucio, come on, you weenie. Get over it.”

Jamie pats Lucio on the shoulders gently, but he’s relishing in the embrace. As tight as it is, it’s still exactly what he needs.

Their boss appears around the corner, and Jamie jolts to attention on instinct, as if he were caught fooling around on the job. He grins at her, and she smiles right back with thin crinkly lips.

“You are doing fine, I see.” Her arms are crossed gently, and her eyes gleam at him with pride.

“Yeah, I’m alright.” He almost feels sheepish with the way she’s looking at him so lovingly, especially when she beckons him with a twist of her fingers to the backroom. He’s mostly nervous.

After pulling Lucio out of his death grip, Jamie follows. The backroom is small, mostly crowded with boxes of tea and supplies, and he’s spent plenty of breaks building forts out of it all. His boss has a separate office nestled in there, shelves of folders and books and a sad, outdated computer. She taps his elbow to get his attention.

“It’s a bit of a mess, isn’t it? Never had much time for cleaning,” she says, and he watches the way her shoulders loosen into a sigh as she looks over the dark, cramped space longingly. Papers are piled haphazardly on top of everything, and the file cabinets look like they haven’t been looked at for years. 

“I like it. Can’t find anything if it’s too organized, I always say.”

“You’re a rascal, Jamison. But I suppose your first job will be to clean up this mess. Don’t throw anything away, just make it nice. After that, I’ll show you how it all works.”

Jamie looks over the cave-like closet and feels that jittery feeling take hold of him again. He’d probably make a bigger mess of things. Always has, always will. “Ya sure about that? Never been the most calculated fella. Can barely remember my own name.”

She taps at him again, and she’s smiling with wise narrow eyes. “Always selling yourself short, aren’t you?”

“Nah, selling myself just right.”

She lets out another sigh, and he's sure it sounds forced and tired. “Don’t sass me, boy, I’m too old.”

“I would never.”

She grabs Jamie’s face, squeezing his cheeks and making his lips purse out. She’s all smiles again, and it’s almost terrifying.

“A woman of my age can only handle so much of your boyish charm. Go home and rest, come back when you are ready. Take your time.”

She starts to push him back out of the room, but he stays grounded, reluctantly.

“Well, uh, ya see I guess that’s just why I stopped by,” he starts, turning back to face her with a hesitant grin. “Don’t really got anywhere to go, Gran. Reyes kicked me out.”

She frowns, and he just keeps going. “I mean, I did blow up the place. Can’t knock him for that.”

“That man is so unreasonable these days,” she huffs. “I’ll give him a call.”

“No, ya don’t gotta do that, really. I needed outta there anyway. Bad memories and all.”

They both are caught up in their thoughts for a moment, and Jamie takes to wringing the hem of his shirt in his hand. He breathes carefully to keep himself from losing it.

“Didn’t think I could stay here?”

It’s an odd way to phrase it, but he gets the question out instead of letting it wrack his anxious little brain apart. His boss seems to piece that together with furrowed eyebrows and a thin frown. He already knows the answer.

“I'm sorry,” she says, and there's one of her endearing Arabic pet names he couldn't figure out, “I can't let you sleep here. And if I had the room, I'd take you home myself. Have you asked those two?”

“They've got dorms this year,” Jamie answers, and he's feeling more and more helpless. His boss looks at a loss for words, and he's right there with her. He's run out of options, and the future's never seemed so daunting. His shoulders jerk up in a shrug, despite his head telling him to give a damn for once.

“Don't worry, I'll figure it out. Done it before, I can do it again.”

“Have you asked the one you came in with? Big guy?”

His skin prickles and his jaw locks. No. No, he couldn't ask Mako, not after he'd already done so much. He'd given him everything; he couldn't ask for more.

“No, he,” and he's trying to think up a decent way to say it. “I already owe him too much.”

“Have him add it to your tab.”

“Gran,” he warns, but she's already twisting him around and scooting him out of the back room. As he turns the corner, he sees Hana trying to strike up conversation with Mako across the counter, who looks both amused and annoyed at the same time. He’d think that’s what he looks like when Jamie talks to him too, but no. He’s got a different face; strange smile, burning eyes, loose body language. He’s comfortable with Jamie, or at least that’s what he hopes.

“Ya better not be embarrassing me,” Jamie calls over, and Hana still has that smarmy smirk that tells it all.

“You do plenty of that on your own.”

Cute. Very cute. He ruffles her hair and pushes her away from Mako, who seems thankful for that. Jamie smiles at him the best he can, pressing his palm to the counter and leaning forward. 

“Let's get something to drink. A flat white, maybe?”

Mako nods, and his lips are a dream to watch. “Only if you make it.”

A ping of pride dances up Jamie’s spine and makes him shiver, but he giggles nervously all the same. This man is too good to him.

It couldn't be that hard, with only one hand. Definitely slower, but not impossible. Confidence surges up in his chest and makes it a little easier as he goes through the motions he'd memorized and thought about even when he slept. Except now everything’s flipped to the left. 

When he gets to the machine, he realizes he can't turn it on and hold the milk at the same time. He wonders what to do, letting the panic take hold for a few seconds before carefully using his right elbow to flip the switch. A small victory.

He's a little rusty, but the milk froths well enough. He feels rather than hears the wand whistle, and he whistles back, just like how he used to. It’s a sound he didn’t think he’d miss so much.

Pouring it into the espresso is another ordeal, and he has to focus on keeping his hand steady. It doesn’t help that Mako’s standing right in front of the counter watching him do it. He moves it all about to create some semblance of a design, for old time’s sake. He makes some ugly misshapen leaves, and while he’s dwelling on the loss of of one of his very few talents, he manages to overfill the cup. The milky brown drink spills onto the counter and he’s cursing under his breath, dabbing paper napkins with a shaky hand. His stump starts to burn, and so do his eyes.

A big hand knocks three times on the counter, and Jamie looks up into deep dark irises that take him away for a moment, reminds him he’s fine, it’s not the end of the world. He reminds himself it’s just coffee, everything is okay, and this is a first step.

“Good job,” those thick lips say, and there’s not an ounce of sarcasm on his face. Mako pulls the cup slowly toward himself, lifting it carefully to not spill any more of it. He takes a gentle sip, and it’s so funny with his enormous size and intimidating character. Jamie leans his elbows on the counter and watches closely, smiling from ear to ear.

“Not my best work, but it’s better than what these gremlins can do.”

Mako nods, and there’s that stupid smile that makes Jamie just as stupid.

Now, he thinks, ask him now. He just made the man a coffee, he’s not allowed to get mad. Jamie squashes the thought down. He can figure this out himself. He can scrape something up and get a motel for a few nights. Maybe the shelter would take him in. He hates the idea of sleeping surrounded by strangers who wouldn’t think twice of stealing the shoes off his feet, but he didn’t have too many choices in the matter.

He’s spacing out again; he’s getting very good at it. Knuckles that read L-E-F-T rap against the counter, and he straightens up. Mako is watching him wrack his brain.

“What’s the plan?”

Jamie clenches his fist and sighs through his nose. He doesn’t want to think about the future anymore. He just wants to go home and sleep this all away. “Dunno, really. Nobody’s got room for me. But don’t worry, mate, I’ll find somewhere. Don’t need to be dragging ya ‘round the whole city. You’re free ta go.”

Mako’s big grey eyebrows furrow together tightly, and Jamie giggles nervously.

“I said don’t worry! Already took too much of ya time. And ya money. I’m tough, I can-”

“You can stay with me, if you want.”

His tongue is suddenly thick in his mouth, and he forgets what he was even going to say. His hand grips the edge of the counter like a lifeline.

“Ya,” he fumbles, and too many things are popping up in his head. “Ya don’t have to do this, mate.”

“I want to.”

He’s sincere; Jamie can tell, and it makes him that much more confused. This had to be some fever dream from his medication.

“I dunno what to say,” he admits, and it’s dumb and cliche, but it’s too hard to articulate right now. “Really?”

Mako nods, and waits for Jamie to compose himself. He doesn’t know if he can. Jamie nods back slowly just so he can ground himself to reality. He shifts his feet restlessly, and he feels a tense little laugh bubbling in his throat.

“Ya turning me into a real mess, ya know. It ain’t fair.”

Mako doesn’t say anything. He just drains his coffee cup.

More crying and hugs swamps Jamie and Mako’s departure. There’s an amused curve at the corners of Mako’s lips as Jamie looks at him like he might save him from the deadly affection, but he doesn’t interrupt. Maybe he’s scared they’ll turn on him too, climbing him like a mountain and asking too many questions. Hana seems ready to do just that, with how she circles him over and over. She keeps her distance, but Jamie knows his phone is going to be blowing up the second they leave.

The time actually spent on the way to Mako’s house passes strangely, and Jamie doesn’t know if it’s the drugs or his proximity to Mako or some weird combination of both. Maybe it’s his attention span, moving from the warmth he can feel against his back and the arms bracketing his shoulders to the puffs of breath he can feel on his hair every once in awhile to the rumble beneath him. It’s all still so new, so strange and wonderful and he just wants it to last forever. It doesn’t, and he’s almost happy for it. Almost.

Mako doesn’t live too far away from the shop. By bus it would be annoying, but by motorcycle it must be a fun commute. As they go farther from the heart of the city, the houses start to look bigger, the streets cleaner. There’s more green and less grey, and the air smells different, clean. He’d never been on this side of town, never known anyone with enough money to afford what most considered “standard living”. Costs an arm and a leg to live like that, and he was already short one. They round a few corners and start to slow down, and he knows it’s Mako’s house when they roll to a stop in front of it.

It’s a small thing. Not quite what Jamie had imagined, but it’s still impressive; definitely better than anything he’s ever had. The roof is blue, and the windows have planter boxes with pink flowers. There’s a nice green lawn just like he thought there’d be, and a thick old oak tree with patches of missing bark. Jamie wonders how long it’s been since he’s walked in grass barefoot, how long it’s been since he climbed a tree. It reminds him of scuffed knees and chasing fireflies when he was an anklebiter.

The garage door starts to open, and he sees mountains of cardboard boxes come into view, all neatly stacked and dusty. They take up a good portion of the garage, and there’s just enough room for the bike. He drives it up slowly, and as soon as they’re in, Jamie smells the dirt and exposed wood. It’s a good smell, like a home improvement store.

Mako is picking him up and setting him down again, and he really hopes they can go run errands or something so he can keep doing that. Jamie takes a slow look around the musty garage, trying to get a good feel of it. He spots a workbench with a beaten red locker beside it, complete with a pegboard with an arrangement of tools and a few spare car parts. It’s well stocked and well used; a pretty thing. If he were more of an idiot, he’d say it’d be a perfect place to make more art. Had he not learned his lesson at all? Did he want to lose his leg while he was at it?

“Ya a mechanic or something?” Jamie asks and turns to watch Mako get off the bike, setting it on its stand. The man shakes his head gently.

“I keep her running,” he says, and it’s adorable how he’s moving his lips the best he can, but it doesn’t quite work. Jamie has to concentrate to understand. “Nothing special.”

“Nah, mate, I bet you’re good with your hands.”

There’s a long silence before that statement really settles in. Why does he have to say stupid things like that? Jamie wheezes out a nervous giggle, but the man just shrugs and leads them to the house. He must not have cared for that innuendo. Jamie inhales sharply and lets it clear his head. Calm the fuck down. Watch your dumb mouth.

Walking through the door connecting the garage to the house, the first thing he notices is how clean it is. It’s not like those model homes he sees in magazines, eerily immaculate and stylish. It’s lived in, and the signs of life are scattered about as they should be; an errant coffee cup and some junk mail discarded on a table. There’s picture frames with smiling faces and shelves of mismatched books. Normal things. Boring things.

Everything’s pretty standard: an entryway, a single hall, an open kitchen behind the living room. There are three doors, which he assumes leads to the bedrooms and bathroom. The carpet is a dingy brown and tan color and matches the beige walls to make the room look dark and warm. It’s somewhat comforting.

Mako shuffles into the kitchen to pull out a kettle, gesturing it to him. Jamie nods in response, and decides to make himself comfortable. The dark brown couch in the living room faced away from the kitchen, but Jamie wants to watch Mako. He sits on the arm of it and swivels his body in his direction.

God, is he handsome. Not conventionally, but he’s exceeding Jamie’s standards. Everything about him is thick and powerful. Huge fingers pull open cabinets, fish out cups, and tuck into tea boxes easily. How does he do that? If Jamie had hands that big, he’d be fumbling and breaking everything he touched. His thumb alone must be the size of Jamie’s cock. That makes him sputter out an incredulous laugh, and Mako eyes him warily.

“Something wrong?”

“Nah,” he says, and Mako’s questioning face just makes him smile wider. “Nothing, mate.”

Mako gets back to it without another word. Jamie bites at his lip as he continues to watch the man lumber about collecting milk and sugar. 

He’s embarrassing himself. He’s in Mako’s house, sitting on his furniture, getting a proper guest’s welcome, and he can’t even keep himself in check. 

How did he even get this far? Dumb luck? Pity? He bets pity. Why else would Mako be doing this? Before the accident, he was so distant and silent and would barely even look at him. Now he’s giving him the world like it’s his job to make sure Jamie’s okay.

It’s odd behavior, sure, maybe there’s something ulterior and Jamie’s too much of an idiot to get it. But he wonders if he should even care. Just let the guy treat him like he’s worth something. This is what he’s wanted since he met him. He’s been dreaming of this exact scenario, he thinks: Domesticity, to be alone in a soft, relaxing place where nothing else matters but themselves, where they can be private and talk and do whatever they want. It’s gentle, like foggy Sunday mornings where you’re too lazy to do anything but look out the window.

When Mako slips a warm mug of tea into his hand, it’s too wonderful, that feeling of contentment. The world is quiet, and maybe that isn’t so bad after all. He’s where he wants to be. The twitchiness under his skin is gone, and it’s replaced with a calm that could keep him warm and fuzzy for an eternity.

Mako is saying something, lips mumbling at him, but Jamie’s still chasing dreams. He blinks a few times to clear the clouds, and Mako’s in his personal space, too close, leaning forward to make sure the cup in Jamie’s hand actually stays there. Jamie barely registers it.

“Sorry, what?”

Mako’s lips press together flat, and he must be getting self conscious of the way they move. It must be awkward to enunciate so widely. But he takes it slow, and the corners start to lift up just slightly.

“I said, I added a lot of sugar. You look the type.”

Jamie looks down at the milky brew in his hand, the heat making his palm feel loose. His thumb caresses the smooth ceramic handle.

“Type, huh? It’s ‘cause I’m twitchy, ain’t it?”

“Yeah,” Mako answers, and moves to the big fluffy armchair by the television. Jamie scoffs gently, pulling the mug up to his lips. He doesn’t really like overly sweet things, but he won’t correct him. He’ll still drink it.

Jamie watches him like he could disappear any second, that this isn’t actually happening and it’s just his fantastic imagination. Mako looks so relaxed, so soft, like he’s lost in a dream too. And he’s watching Jamie right back with focused dark eyes, reading him like a goddamn book. This is all very strange, suddenly, like they’re both trying to figure each other out, but no one is willing to ask the first question, and it’s bringing back that tremble in Jamie’s fingers. Mako nods his head curtly.

“You can sit on the sofa, you know.”

Jamie swallows a lump in his throat before sliding his butt off the arm and down onto the cushion. He makes sure not to jostle his cup and spill tea everywhere. “Thanks.”

Where does it go from here? This is terribly awkward. He keeps the mug close to his mouth as if to hide behind it, hoping the tea’s dull aroma will settle his nerves a bit.

“Ya, uh,” Jamie bravely starts, “Ya being awful nice to me, mate. I ain’t done nothing for ya.”

Mako has the hint of a frown on those full lips, but he hides it behind his mug, just like Jamie. Maybe he’s feeling just as cautious and overwhelmed. Jamie can hope, at least.

He’s waiting for an answer, and even though he’s deaf he can practically hear the ticking of the clock above the mantle. He kicks his feet nervously, knocks his knees together, until Mako finally lowers the mug again.

“You don’t have to go to work for a while, then?”

Jamie’s caught off guard by the change of subject, but he’s just happy to have something to break the weird tension. He’ll have to badger him for his intentions later.

“Yeah, I’m still numbed up on painkillers, probably not the best idea to have me around until I’m good and sober.”

“Should I trust you in my house for that long?”

Jamie took another drink of the syrupy tea to hide his grin. “Nah, ya really shouldn’t.”

Mako’s smiling a little, just by the tiniest hint, and immediately hides it by taking another drink. It makes the fluttering in Jamie’s heart go crazy.

It’s more long moments of awkwardness; nobody speaking, just enjoying their tea and the strange atmosphere. He’s not sure what to do. Mako offers a tour of the house after a while, and he shows him around with gestures instead of words. Everything is pretty plain except for the occasional pig themed toy or keychain hiding among his scarce, scattered possessions. It almost seems like he doesn’t even live here. The second bedroom doesn’t even have anything in it, which makes Jamie wonder why it hasn’t been turned into a guest room or a fun room or even just somewhere to put all those cardboard boxes in the garage. The garage probably has more things in it than the house does.

When it starts to get dark, Mako gets the couch ready for him, covering it in a sheet and an extravagantly fluffy duvet. It’s a pretty comfy set up, considering it’s still a couch, and Jamie melts right into it. It smells strange; not a bad strange, but it’s that distinctive unique smell that every house has. He’s not used to it yet.

He watches Mako press his hand to the light switch, and Mako watches Jamie right back.

“Good night,” Mako says. It’s so reserved and mumbled that Jamie can’t read it at all, but he knows it’s the only thing that matches. Jamie’s toes curl under the thick blanket.

“G’night, Mako.”

The house is suddenly painted in deep blues and blacks, and the shadows from outside come through as thick lines from the shutters. The light in Mako’s bedroom bleeds through the dark, and Mako moves toward it, leaving Jamie to rest. The door is left open, and Jamie bites his lip. How easy would it be to just sneak in there and slide into the sheets beside him? He’d curl up on that big huge bed and just listen to him breathe. Well, feel him breathe. It would be the bravest thing Jamie’s ever done.

After what feels like an eternity, that light pops off too, and the only light left is the phone clutched in Jamie’s hand. It brightens up his face and tints everything around it a soft white color.

He’s too curious. Mako is being distant, like he’s unsure of how to approach Jamie, and it’s pressing all of Jamie’s buttons. They’re both acting like they haven’t been flirting this entire time. He’s not the same guy who was texting him when he needed him most. It was so easy over the phone. Now that they’re talking in person, neither of them know what to do. It’s an awkward song and dance and they’re both terrible at it.

His thumb rubs lines across his phone’s keyboard, swipes words together. He doesn’t want it to be this way forever. He has to be the one to break it down, or it might never happen. He takes slow, calm breaths.

-This is really weird, isn’t it?-

Jamie presses the bright screen to his chest, and the room goes black. He looks up to the little window over the kitchen sink, and he starts to see the moonlight coming through the white plastic shades.

The phone rumbles in his hand.

-Yeah-

Jamie exhales smoothly, and nestles his head further into the plush arm of the couch.

-I don’t want 2 intrude. U didn’t have 2 offer-

Jamie looks over at Mako’s room, and he can see the faintest hint of light from his own phone.

-I want you here-

Jamie feels his chest bloom, his throat begging to release a sound. He looks to the ceiling for solace and finds none. His thumb shakes and struggles to put his thoughts into words.

-I want 2 b here-

His phone buzzes, and the vibrations pull at his very soul.

-Good-

This isn’t fair. He’s getting that awful drumming in his chest, all flustered skin and wavering smile, caught between relief and awe. Why can’t they say these things aloud? It’s juvenile how shy they’re being, and yet seeing the words on this little screen in this dark room makes him feel warmer than any blanket ever could.

He wants to say so much. He wants to flirt and tease and speak truly, and he wants Mako to do the same. But maybe Mako doesn’t want to, can’t. How hard must it be to speak what you mean when they can’t even hear you?

Jamie’s stomach is doing flips, and he feels tightness in his jaw like he might let loose a pent up sob. As much as this is ruining him, he still can’t get over the fact that he’s here in the first place. This isn’t something he deserves, let alone expected. He should be sleeping in a park or under an overpass, not on this warm couch in this cute little house with his obsession trying to sleep in the next room. The light from Mako’s phone still glows in the blackness.

He’s waiting for Jamie.

Jamie wonders why.

-Why r u doing this? U barely no me-

He doesn’t. He’s just that skinny loser who keeps making goo goo eyes at him as if he can’t see the infatuation written all over his face. He’s a nobody; not worth a damn, got nothing to his name. All he’s ever done with his life is make mistakes. What did he do to earn this?

Jamie’s waiting with bated breath that sits in his chest and won’t come out, as he watches that faint light from across the room. His hand is clammy from holding the phone so tight, and enveloping himself in the soft blanket isn’t helping. He presses his nose into it, and he smells stale fabric softener, like it hasn’t seen the light of day since it’s been washed, stuffed into a closet until a guest finally needs it. And he does. He needs it so badly.

His phone hums in his palm, and he knows this is it. This is what he’s been waiting for.

-Nobody’s looked at me like that in a long time-

Jamie doesn’t want to look away. He feels like he should jump about and scream and cheer, but he stays bundled into the couch, afraid to move, staring. Words burn into his brain like he means to keep them in there forever, and he hadn’t realized he was holding his breath until his lungs feel tight and painful. When he finally blinks, the dryness stings, and his eyes are watery. Yeah, that must be it.

In his peripheral vision, the light from Mako’s phone is gone, and Jamie lets out what must sound like a pitiful hushed whimper. His head feels like it’s full of cotton, the air is smothering him, and the night is the most beautiful it’s ever been. He looks into the dense black, and the moonlight kisses the outlines of the home.

The door to his room is open.


	10. Cross That Line

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THE BURN IS OVER
> 
> Maui voice: YOU'RE WELCOME

Morning does not come quietly.

It comes with a shout and a gasp, as if there’s no air left in his whole body, and his eyes squeeze shut so hard he sees every color at once.

Pain.

It erupts out of his stump as if he’s growing a new fucking hand, and it claws up his arm like sharp shadows boring into his skin. He can nearly feel his old fingers again, but they’re all broken and twisted and tied up tight. Suddenly, the bandages on his arm are too hot, burning and sizzling, and he rips them off as quickly as he can.

The sun hasn’t risen yet, but the early glow is starting to ebb away the night. He opens his eyes to a barely lit home, and grasps at his misbehaving limb.

It throbs to the tune of his heart, each beat sending thick hot tremors through his blood. He feels it everywhere, like a migraine on high. He tries to keep his sounds to himself, but it’s not working. He still hasn’t relearned volume control, and he’s afraid he could be screaming and not even know it. He grinds his teeth and lets out an anguished hiss.

He touches it, and it’s burning like a fever. The skin is bruised and angry, nothing new, and the stitches are bold and foreign against it. He’ll be getting them removed soon, and he wonders if that’ll make this any easier. Between the stitches are deep black scabs, and his muscles pulse and twitch with each shallow breath he takes.

“Fuck,” he whispers to the empty room, massaging around his elbow, close enough to the wound to try and relieve some of the pressure without actually touching it. He tries to rub the ache away, but it refuses to go, just tears and stabs and rips him apart, and yet he’s perfectly fine.

He’d felt like this a few times at the hospital, but he was high on morphine for the majority of it. It was a dull pain then, like a banged up knee or a twisted ankle. Now it feels like it’s eating him alive.

He bashes his head back into the arm of the couch, the thump of finding the wooden frame makes pain bloom in his skull, and it helps distract him. He twists his body about in a fit, curling his toes in the cushions and arching his back. It’s a terrible itch, thrumming in his veins and he feels the need to just rip it all out. His fingernails scratch into his skin hard, pinching, hurting, as if digging for whatever is infecting him.

Breathing is an issue. He can’t keep concentration, and his brain gives up on his lungs. His chest is tight and he inhales so slowly it makes his head feel full and airy. He’d prefer death, he thinks, curling his body up tight and clutching at the ropey muscles in his forearm. He just needs to ride it out, but these few minutes already seem like hours, ages.

Then he feels it: Big, thick fingers resting over his, gentle and coaxing. It’s warm, not burning, rough and calloused. His body jerks, sitting up in surprise, and his eyes find Mako’s in the morning glow. He looks tired, and the bags under his eyes look heavy, but here he is, kneeling beside him and massaging at Jamie’s imagined limb. He rubs circles around the wound, dancing around it with care, and scaring away the parasite that keeps biting at him underneath his clammy flesh.

It’s a new sensation to cling to. Staring up at Mako gives him something to do, something to focus on beyond the stinging agony. His watery eyes take in what he can in the low light, and he sees Mako’s scar up close, his dark brown eyes, his indifferent lips. For the first time, Jamie sees him without his ponytail. Long, white tresses rest easy on his shoulders. Mako doesn’t look at him, only paying attention to the problem at hand, and lets Jamie enjoy memorizing his face without any of the awkwardness. Mako silently works his thumbs into Jamie’s skin, running his touch over every inch he can, up his inner elbow and back down. He’s careful with the wound, just skirting the edges, testing which areas hurt more by Jamie’s twitches and jolts. The more he wiggles, the more he rubs, and Jamie can finally feel his body start to loosen.

He takes a deep, much-needed breath, and he feels the shivers growing less violent, the ache less piercing. He lets Mako caress him into a sweet coma, growing numb from the constant touch. His bones feel heavy, but his skin feels raw and fresh and open. His body sweats and huffs and a needy moan leaves him involuntarily. It feels pitiful, and somewhat vulgar, but Mako is right here, right in front of him, and it’s not the scenario he planned out for them. He'd figured there would be more flirting involved, at least a date or two before he got here. There'd be dinner and a movie and they'd have their first kiss at a restaurant or cafe or walking up to the door, like Hollywood had told him they should. But fuck it. He’s waited long enough. This is too damn easy, and it feels so damn right.

He surges forward, and he’s kissing him, hard and breathless. His lips press desperately to Mako’s, and they’re so big and soft he might get lost in them. Mako freezes, stops petting at his arm, and Jamie takes that moment to push further, to raise his remaining hand up to the silvery hair at Mako's temple. He presses the tips of his fingers into it, combing gently as he keeps on kissing him. Maybe he’s making a fool of himself. Maybe it was wrong to assume this is okay. All he’s thinking about is how cloudy his head is, how warm and wonderful those lips are, how that text message had made him feel. It culminates in a stupid, blinding desire that turns his insides to soup. He is totally lovestruck.

He pulls away to breathe, and Mako is looking at him with something he doesn’t quite understand. His gut twists. Maybe he had gone too far. Maybe Mako is just being good to him and doesn’t want any part of this. A hot knife carves a hole in his chest and doubt settles into the space. He closes his mouth and sucks in another breath through his nose, shifting in his seat, and it’s not just his arm that aches anymore.

They’re only inches away, hot breaths puff between them, and Jamie just wants to kiss him again, kiss him forever. The fingers in Mako’s hair stay strong, keeping him close, even though the man could easily just get up and walk away. Mako looks like he’s stuck where he is, staring Jamie down just as Jamie is doing to Mako.

It’s a good dream and a nightmare rolled into one as the palm of his hand slides down Mako’s face slow like honey, and he feels the rough, pale stubble on his jaw. It's thick and prickly, and he wants to rub into it. Mako doesn't look away, not for a second, and Jamie is struggling to figure out what happens next. He could try again, hopefully garner a reaction this time, but the thought of being rejected cuts worse than a missed opportunity. He may need to apologize.

But then Mako leans forward by the slightest little bit, wordless, and Jamie feels fireworks behind his eyes. He forgets everything, every goddamn thought holding him back. When Jamie kisses him this time, it's electric, and Mako kisses back with a sudden vigor that makes Jamie short circuit. He pulls Mako in, and the man obediently follows.

Their lips move together, trying to figure each other out, and it's wet and tender and even better than he imagined. Their noses poke and brush their cheeks, and after a moment he feels two big hands circle his waist. God, if that isn't the best feeling in the world. Jamie closes his eyes and lets Mako take him over without hesitation. 

Kissing isn't something he's had the most practice with. Now that he thinks about it, he hasn't kissed anyone like this since high school, and he was sure he'd been a sloppy idiot then too. He works his lips to match Mako, and he loves the way they're sliding into the same pace. Mako is carefully drawing himself up and onto the couch with Jamie, laying him back across the cushions, and it makes Jamie feel like a snake charmer: seductive, and, more importantly, wanted.

It's a little fast, and he feels Mako’s thick, warm fingers teasing at the hem of Jamie’s shirt. He pushes it up until it’s bunched under his arms, revealing his tight stomach and the much less sexy signs of malnutrition. A diet of hospital jello and meager portions has left him looking like a bag of bones. Thumbs swirl against his prominent ribs with gentle curiosity. He knows Mako will be trying to fix that.

A leg between his thighs, a huge body looming over his, and Jamie is overwhelmed. The kiss is getting so heavy he can’t think anymore. Mako’s tongue is so big in his mouth, and it swipes over his lower lip and his teeth and Jamie meets it the best he can. He opens wide, and when their lips lock together, it’s like he’s drowning. He breathes fast through his nose, and it creates a humid heat between their faces.

Eventually, Mako pulls away, and the magic is suddenly gone, their eyes open. They breathe each other’s air, and their foreheads press together in a way that makes Jamie whimper in shameless want, but he’s lost his voice, lost his mind. Mako looks like he might fall asleep right on top of him, with hazy, tired eyes and languid movements. He doesn’t move off of him, but his hands leave Jamie’s stomach and press into the cushion by his head. Jamie is dazed by the proximity, by the smell of his skin and the taste lingering in his mouth.

“I have to get ready for work,” he says, and it feels quiet, like a whisper. Jamie would be lamenting about a moment ruined if it weren’t for the look on Mako’s face. Thick lips are suddenly tight, and his eyes refuse to look anywhere but at him.

He doesn’t want to go. 

What a beautiful thought, to stay like this for just a few more minutes. Seconds, even. Mako's belly is mashed wonderfully against his own, and the feeling of being lovingly crushed sends his thoughts aflutter. His hand is still in Mako’s hair, and he wants to keep that silky feeling there always. The way he leans over Jamie, the way all that silver falls like a curtain around their heads, makes him feel like it’s just them and nothing else. The tips tickle his neck as their heavy breathing blows it about. Jamie tucks some of it behind the man's ear, and they come back to the little dark living room. 

Courageously, he smiles, big and bright.

“Somebody’s gonna have to make the money around here, mate.”

He leans up to kiss him again, soft and chaste, but it’s still just as intimate. Mako smiles into it -he can feel it- and begrudgingly pulls himself away.

Jamie lays there and watches him go back to his room. His hand rests on his bare stomach, and he runs his fingers over the spots Mako had touched, drawing little circles around them as if to remember exactly where.

His head is swimming with fluff, and he breathes in deep and cleansing. Everything slows down, and the tones of yellow sunshine stretching from the windows bathe him and everything within its reach. Sweet, warm, and pure.

Is he allowed to feel this happy? It can’t be right. He turns his head to press his nose into the plush back cushions of the couch, and breathes in a scent that he would consider “homey”. It smells like Mako.

He’d probably be hearing the man brushing his teeth or rummaging about, and if he reaches down to touch the floor, he can feel the creaks of movement in the next room. He waits for him to appear again, and he doesn’t bother to pull his shirt back down. He’s perfect where he is. Eventually, Mako comes back dressed in his work clothes, white shirt ready for a hard day’s work to turn it brown and stained. He fiddles with the watch on his wrist, and Jamie wonders how he can even find a band big enough to fit him. His hair is pulled up into that fluffy ponytail, and Jamie wants to run his fingers through it.

Mako is watching him too, and as he walks toward the door to the garage, he hesitates. The doorknob is almost in his grasp, but it’s as if he’s afraid to touch it. Jamie’s heart is popping in his chest, and he raises himself onto his elbows, nodding his head curtly.

“Don’t leave a guy hangin’.”

Mako listens, and Jamie can’t help the giggle that escapes him. It’s only a few short steps before Mako is looming over him again, leaning down and kissing him one last time. It’s not fair how nice that feels, and that he has to wait so long for another one. This time, Jamie’s hand finds Mako’s neck, letting his fingers sink into the groove of his collarbone, the slope of his shoulder. He wants nothing more than to drag him down and get back to where they left off, but he knows he can’t. The anticipation is going to kill him, as if he weren’t already such an excitable person. Mako lays his palm on Jamie’s chest, pushing him back down onto the couch before he can get to the good stuff. He whines and wiggles, but Mako keeps him away.

“Later,” Mako says, and Jamie can feel him say it through his fingers, low and hungry. There’s no rush, he chides himself. There’s plenty of time. Everything’s fine.

Mako leaves him, and once the door is closed, Jamie lays his hand on the carpet again. He waits for the rumble of the motorcycle and soon it comes, vibrating through the floor and into his fingers. He feels it idle before it quickly grows lighter and lighter until there’s nothing left. The ground is still, and he is alone.

Mako really, really shouldn’t have trusted Jamie by himself. He hasn’t been in a house since he ran away from home, and he’s going to take his time exploring every inch of it. He hopes Mako doesn’t have anything to hide, because he will absolutely find it by the end of the day. He rolls off the couch and gets to work.

His first stop is the backyard that Mako had forgotten to show him on the tour. There’s a sliding glass door by the kitchen, and with a click, it’s wide open and letting in the cool morning air. There isn’t much back there, just some overgrown grass and another tree that brings out Jamie’s nostalgia. This one is thin, young, and hardly good for climbing. It doesn’t look like Mako spends much time out here, given the lack of landscaping. He notes the pink flowers growing in an aluminum box by the door before going back inside.

He scavenges around the kitchen next, opening every cupboard and drawer. He finds the usual things: silverware, do-dads, a junk drawer full of batteries and odds and ends. On the counter, there’s a collection of bottle caps in a wiry canister that resembles a pig. He also finds a pink pig shaped bottle opener. He starts to see a trend.

The pantry and fridge are well stocked, but there’s barely anything that Jamie normally eats. He’s used to packaged meals, frozen or otherwise. Junk, he supposes. There’s nothing but real food, ingredients, nothing he knows what to do with. Thankfully there’s a bag of thinly sliced turkey and cheese in the fridge. At least he can manage to make a sandwich.

Distracted by food, he sits on the kitchen counter as he eats, kicking his feet against the cupboards below. It’s a cute, small kitchen. There’s vegetarian cookbooks by the microwave, and a little potted flower by the sink. It’s pink, just like the ones in the backyard and in the windowsill out front. It’s bright and healthy, and Jamie knows Mako must have a green thumb, or at least dabble. He imagines him tending a whole garden, and it makes him smile.

After lunch, he takes his meds and makes his way back to the living room, inspecting the books on the shelves. There are a few mechanic guides and a couple war memoirs. Romance novels make up a majority of the selection, and Jamie lets out a great cackle. He rifles through the pages, trying to find the steamiest scenes to laugh at, and is only slightly turned on by them. Just slightly.

There's a closet by the front door, and when he opens it, he finds four big jackets. He immediately grabs one and puts it on. It's some sort of fancy trench coat, with thick satin lining and pockets big enough to fit dinner plates. It drags on the floor by a good few inches, and his arms drown in the vast length of the sleeves. There are rows of buttons, double breasted, but he could easily wrap the coat around himself twice. Jamie feels like a child trying on his dad's clothes.

He heads to the garage, which seems to be the most interesting part of the house. The workbench is still calling his name, and he pulls open drawer after drawer of parts and pieces. There’s a bin of greasy car parts under the desk, and the urge grows stronger. He knows he could spend his whole afternoon playing here, creating something out of nothing, but one hand is not enough to work with. He runs his fingers over the cold, sleek metal of wrenches, sifts them through cans of bolts, and relives his artistic dreams until he grows too tired, too upset.

At that point, it’s Mako’s break time. He thinks it’s kind of weird that he remembers exactly when he takes his break every day, but then again, he always made him coffee at that time. It’s become ingrained. He has the inkling that Mako will be texting him, and he runs off to get his phone.

He’s right. One unread message blinks on the screen, and he throws himself on the couch, making himself comfy.

-I hope you’re not trashing my house-

-Have sum faith, pls. Im a good houseguest- 

Jamie feels a little sneaky, snooping around. He hadn’t even looked at all the cardboard boxes yet. He’d save that for tomorrow. Best not to let Mako know, if he didn’t already suspect it.

-Help yourself to the fridge. I’ve got movies under the TV-

-Is that where u keep the porn?-

Is that too bold? No. He rubs his knees together at the thought of what they’d do when Mako comes home. Before his dick can get too hard, the phone buzzes.

-Yes-

He rolls off the couch again, padding over to the TV stand. He pulls open the glass doors to reveal a collection of movies too old for his taste, and the number of porn titles is a resounding zero. Jamie huffs.

-Thats not funny-

-Yes it is. I’ll be home in a few hours.-

Jamie is excited all over again, but nowhere to go with it. He decides to forgo the movies and take a trip to the room he was waiting to explore last.

The bedroom is large, with a master bathroom that’s surprisingly big enough to fit Mako comfortably. There isn’t much here but blank walls and heavy blackout curtains. The bedside table has a scattering of hair ties and loose change, and a bright red alarm clock. Feeling frisky, he opens the drawer, and it’s just what he wanted to see: a tube of lubricant and condoms. For a moment he worries about how often they’re being used, but upon inspection, he finds the condoms have been expired for nearly three months. A wave of relief and newfound adoration fills his body.

Mako’s bed is clean and the sheets are made. Jamie wonders if he’s ever made his bed in his whole life, or who in their right mind even has the time for that. He slides down onto the comforter, and it's cool to the touch. It smells even more like Mako than the couch does, and when he rests his head on one of the pillows, it surrounds him completely. It's a mix of cologne, sweat, and something he can't figure out. Maybe shampoo or aftershave. Whatever it is, it’s all melded together into something distinct and uniquely Mako. He wants to cover himself in it until it permeates his very skin.

He doesn't know when he falls asleep, but it’s the kind of sleep that leaves him feeling drowsy and heavy, like the bed is sucking him in and he can’t get out. He wakes to the one thing he craves most, and is showered in affection immediately.

Mako’s hands slide up his shirt, thumbing at the lines of his chest, and they kiss like they mean it. Jamie moves slowly, and any minute he could fall right back asleep. He lulls his head against the pillow, and takes a moment to assess the situation.

“Am I dreaming?” He watches Mako lean over him, fingers tugging and pulling at his clothes impatiently.

“Maybe.”

That sounds like something a dream would say. But he goes along with it, and he shimmies his hips as his shorts are popped open and dragged down his legs. If this is a dream, it's fantastic. If it's not, well, that's even better. 

His hand reaches up to stroke along Mako's chest through his dirty shirt before resting at his shoulder. Holding onto him gives him some sense of stability, especially with the way Mako rubs circles over his hip bones, big, soft fingers pushing them down teasingly. They hook into the waistband of his underwear, and Jamie moans. 

Mako taps at his chin, and only then does he realize that he'd closed his eyes. He opens them, still bleary with sleep, and Mako is speaking.

“Huh?” Very eloquent.

“Are you ready?”

Is that nervousness he sees on that big, handsome face? There’s a spark of it in his eyes, and he’s probably reading that wrong, but it makes Jamie feel more in control of himself, more confident. He leans up off the pillow to kiss him again, and he doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to stop. They move their mouths together to the roll of his hips, his neglected erection straining against his clothes. He feels the hardness between Mako’s legs as he grinds against him, and it’s heavenly. Their lips let off with a pop, and he gasps, hungry to breathe him in.

“Mate, ya don’t know how ready I am.”

Mako finally frees him from his underwear, and the cool air on his cock makes it jump and slap against his belly. It’s normal to feel self conscious the first time you show your junk to someone, he supposes, and he feels his heart hammering away, waiting for a reaction. Is he too small? He’d always thought he was at least average. Shit. Everything’s small with Mako around. His hips twitch and he has the sudden need to distract Mako from his junk, but the man seems entranced with it, looking down at it unwaveringly. It sets Jamie’s nerves alight.

“Don’t just,” Jamie whines, kicking a leg up and kneeing Mako in the waist, “Don’t look at it like that!”

Mako’s hand engulfs his ankle easily, rubbing a huge thumb over the bone reassuringly. He spreads Jamie’s legs wider, and Jamie can’t help the immediate pulse of arousal in his blood. Mako slides his other hand up his bare white thigh, going for the prize. “Sorry. It’s been a while.”

He wraps his big hand around it, smothering it, and Jamie reels at the feeling. Mako’s palm is hot and thick against the head. It squeezes him at the base and works up and down gently. It’s delicious. Jamie’s too excited, and he hasn’t touched himself in forever, much less had anyone else do it. His hips jerk and shiver with each slow, sensual stroke, and he spits out any sound he can. He moans and cries out and gasps, dragging Mako down further on top of him. Eventually he’s crushing him, his round stomach pressed hard onto Jamie’s skinny one, and Mako can’t move his hand anymore. Jamie pants across his cheek and digs his fingers into the nape of his neck.

“Ya gotta show me yours too, ya know.”

Mako is kissing him again, and Jamie can’t believe how greedy he is for it. He arches his back until their chests meet, but Mako is worming his way out of his pants, and it’s difficult with Jamie trying to trap him where he is. Jamie is forced to tear away to give him enough room, and he falls back to the pillow with an impatient huff.

 

He watches the buckle come undone, the button pop, the zipper go down. The suspense chips away at his already failing composure, and he waits with bated breath as Mako pushes his pants and underwear lower and lower until they’re bunched up at his knees.

His cock is thick, just like the rest of him, with prominent veins and a ruddy head. It looks small in Mako’s massive hands, but it must be double the size of Jamie’s easily, maybe triple. It’s leaking and pulsing, ready to go, and he loves it.

“Fuck,” he whispers, and he sees Mako’s body ripple with gentle laughter. “That’s a beaut.”

Mako says something, probably about double standards, and sidles up against him, shifting his knees to spread Jamie’s legs apart wide enough to fit him. He reaches over Jamie toward the side table, pulling the lube out from the drawer. The cap clicks open, and he dabs some onto his fingers. Jamie feels his libido kick into overdrive, and he clenches his fist in the comforter as Mako pumps himself with slick, strong motions. He guides it down to Jamie, and when they press together, it’s like white hot heat.

Dear lord, is that nice. Mako rubs them together, taking Jamie into his fist as well, and starts moving his hips. Jamie arches and thrusts back, desperate for more. It’s a sweet fire between them, and each thrust burns bright. Mako’s other hand wraps around his thigh, and he marvels at just how fragile it looks in his grip.

He wants to reach up and tug Mako on top of him again, but then there wouldn’t be room for their rutting. He wiggles and moans and moves the best he can while being held down. Mako meets him halfway on each thrust, keeping his fist tight and the beat in time. Jamie admires the way he looks like this, so dominant and powerful. He watches Mako’s brows furrow in concentration, his eyes flutter closed on a particularly good thrust. His lips loosen for a groan, and then tighten when the pleasure hits home. It's a real treat to see.

Just like the kissing, Jamie wishes this could go on forever, but he feels the tell tale warmth in his gut, spreading through him far too quickly for his liking. He thrusts into Mako’s giant hand with need, and Mako responds immediately, pressing their cocks together harder and pumping faster.

He doesn’t need to tell Mako he’s close. He’s sure the man can understand from the way he writhes and howls and trembles, the way he bites at the shirt still pulled up to his neck. Mako squeezes his thigh to the point of bruising (at least that’s what Jamie hopes), and pulls Jamie’s hips up to rest on his lap. It’s a vulnerable position, with his legs spread so wide it hurts, but that’s definitely what makes him cum so hard he sees spots.

He croons and arches sharply, lifting himself off the bed as Mako milks him for all he’s got. It slicks up his hand even more, making the thrust of their cocks smoother than silk. His hips convulse and he cries out as the sensation continues to the point of exhaustion, of fiery stimulation. But he wants to feel Mako cum too.

Jamie reaches down to stop Mako’s hand before he loses his goddamn mind, and he relinquishes. Jamie’s dick flops back down, happy and spent, but Mako’s still stands at attention, yearning for more. So Jamie gives it to him.

He wraps his hand around it, but he can just barely touch his fingers to his thumb, and he has long fingers. The thought makes him shiver. It’s hot with cum and lube, velvety soft and twitching. Mako shifts impatiently, and Jamie is disappointed he can’t continue appreciating the look and feel of it. There will be more time for cock worship later.

He starts to pump, tight and possessive, and he feels Mako tense with pleasure. It won’t be long for him either. His big hand reaches down to squeeze Jamie’s thin waist, and his touch is cold with slick. It makes Jamie jump, but moan all the same.

He loves the way Mako moves his hips into his fist, thrusting into his hand. Jamie is suddenly the one in control, even though Mako still looms over him like a mountain, and it seems impossible to be able to dominate someone so absolutely huge and stoic. Jamie’s heart leaps at the sight of Mako losing himself to the feeling of Jamie, just Jamie.

He spurts into his hand with a roar that vibrates all the way to the tips of Jamie’s wild hair, and the hands clutch at him with such force that he winces. But he smiles a big, stupid grin as he watches Mako cum onto his concave stomach. Mako’s face is pinched and hips sputter to a stop once he’s done. Jamie lets go as Mako starts to tremble, and the heavy cock flops into the mess between them.

The internal hum of sex has left his ears, and it’s silent again. They’re breathing hard, and Jamie starts to feel cold, wet, and tired. At his slightest wiggle of discomfort, Mako gets off the bed, picks up his pants, and walks to the master bathroom.

He would have preferred to bask in that a little bit more, but he’ll take what he can get. He takes long, full breaths to even himself out, and his excited heart begins to slow to a rest. 

Was that alright? It sure felt amazing, but was it okay? There’s still something nagging at him that he’s on thin ice and he’s going to do something stupid enough for it all to come crashing down. It’ll only be one moment and the dream will be over. His brain won’t let him have this. It’s too normal. It’s not how things are supposed to go for him.

Fuck it all. He’s allowed to be happy. He finds himself dipping fingers into the hot sticky cum while he’s miles away, and Mako’s already back, batting his hand away. A wet towel swipes at his stomach, cleaning away the evidence. He wipes it along his soft cock and it makes him shudder, but he feels better already.

Jamie pulls his shirt down, but he looks strange with no pants on. He looks to Mako for what to do next, and he’s already sliding the sheets out from under him and covering him up. The blankets are warm over his cold, naked legs, and he watches Mako round the side of the bed to get in too. The mattress dips and the change in weight has Jamie rolling over onto him.

It’s so warm against his stomach, and when Mako secures him in place with one weighty arm, he goes in for another kiss. This time it’s slow and soft, thankful more than anything. Jamie maneuvers his own arm up and around Mako’s neck, pulling at his hair tie until it comes free. Pretty white hair falls down around them, and he feels the sudden urge to braid it. When they pull away to breathe, he’s already playing with the ends of it.

Mako is smiling that terribly funny smile of his, and Jamie loves how close he is to it now. He presses his thumb to the corner of the man’s lips, and pulls it up until he can see the teeth underneath.

“Learn to smile,” Jamie says, and feels something playful murmured against his fingertip. “It’s like you’re snarling at me. Ain’t very nice.”

Mako turns his head away from the finger pulling at his lips, but his smile does look a little more friendly. “Don’t tell me how to smile. Yours is all teeth.”

Jamie demonstrates, and it earns him another eager kiss.


End file.
